The Faerie Queene: Books I-VI

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book One

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book One

Edited, with Introduction, by

Carol V. Kaske Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. Indianapolis/Cambridge

Copyright © 2006 by Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved 06 07 08 09

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

For further information, please address Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 44937 Indianapolis, IN 46244-0937 www.hackettpublishing.com Cover art: Walter Crane illustration and ornament for Book One, The Faerie Queene, ca. 1890. Cover design by Abigail Coyle Interior design by Elizabeth Wilson Composition by Professional Book Compositors Printed at Edwards Brothers, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spenser, Edmund, 1552?–1599. The faerie queene / Edmund Spenser. v. cm. Contents: Book one / edited, with introduction, by Carol Kaske — Book five / edited, with introduction, by Abraham Stoll Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-87220-808-7 (bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-807-9 (pbk. : bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-802-8 (bk. 5) — ISBN 0-87220-801-X (pbk. : bk. 5) 1. Knights and knighthood—Poetry. 2. Epic poetry, English. 3. Virtues —Poetry. I. Kaske, Carol V., 1933– II. Stoll, Abraham Dylan, 1969– III. Title.

PR2358.A3K37 2006 821'.3—dc22 2005026668 ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-808-7 (cloth: bk. 1) ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-807-0 (pbk.: bk. 1) e-ISBN: 978-1-60384-039-2 (e-book)

CONTENTS

Abbreviations Introduction

vii ix

The Faerie Queene, Book One The Letter to Raleigh The Life of Edmund Spenser Textual Notes Glossary Index of Characters Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

v

1 205 209 212 213 217 218

ABBREVIATIONS Citations from other books of The Faerie Queene are documented in this volume in the conventional format, listing book, canto, stanza, and line number. For example, II.i.33.4 refers to Book Two, Canto One, stanza 33, line 4. Citations from Book One do not list the book number: x.1.9 refers to Book One, Canto Ten, stanza 1, line 9. ACH

Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queene. Edited by A. C. Hamilton.

Aeneid

Virgil, Aeneid.

Colin Clout

Spenser, Edmund. InYale Edition of the Shorter Poems.

F.E.

‘Faults escaped in the Print,’ 1590 ed.

GL

Tasso, Torquato. Gerusalemme Liberata.

M&P

Edmund Spenser’s Poetry, 3rd edition. Edited by Hugh Maclean and Anne Lake Prescott.

Metamorphoses

Ovid, Metamorphoses.

OED

Oxford English Dictionary.

OF

Ariosto, Ludovico. Orlando Furioso.

SE

Hamilton, A. C., et al., eds. The Spenser Encyclopedia.

TPR

Edmund Spenser: The Faerie Queene. Edited by Thomas P. Roche.

Var.

The Works of Edmund Spenser, a Variorum Edition. Edited by Edwin Greenlaw, et al.

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INTRODUCTION 1. The Place of The Faerie Queene in English Literature Spenser holds a secure place in the canon—insofar as there still is a canon—just below Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton. This is partly because his longest work, The Faerie Queene (about 35,000 lines), is a fantastic and myth-imbued narrative, and one involving basic moral issues. C. S. Lewis claims he never knew anyone who “used to like The Faerie Queene.” By this he meant that while some people do not like it, one can never revert to distaste once one gets on Spenser’s wavelength. Perhaps I should say “wavelengths,” for one of his strengths is his variety of moods, modes, or tones, ranging from the pious, through the heroic and patriotic, through the sentimental, to the comic and satiric. Spenser has been called “the poet’s poet,” in that his poetic effects yield to analysis (e.g., the analysis of his versification, below) and hence to imitation more easily than do, say, those of Shakespeare. Not only Keats and Tennyson, but also Milton, Shelley, Wordsworth, and Yeats went through apprenticeships to Spenser in various respects. Melville imitated him not only in his poetry but also in his prose, as did Hawthorne in his prose. With respect to content, Milton praised Spenser’s “forests and enchantments drear / Where more is meant than meets the ear” (“Il Penseroso,” 120) and rated him “a greater teacher than Scotus or Aquinas” (Areopagitica).

2. Versification Another of Spenser’s appeals is his versification, an achievement for which he sometimes sacrificed meaning, clarity, or conciseness. Spenser invented a distinctive and demanding but (for all its countless repetitions) satisfying stanza for The Faerie Queene: nine lines, mostly in pentameter, with a rhyme scheme of ababbcbcc. It was based on existing stanzas, such as the eight-line stanza of Ariosto and Tasso. The b ending recurs four times and stitches the entire stanza together. Still, when line 5 is supplied with the b ending (the third occurrence of b), the effect is destabilizing: now this b-rhyme is no longer appearing in an even-numbered line, as previously, but in an odd one (as the emerging quatrain of lines 5 through 8 displays the rhyme pattern of bcbc). Line 8, while picking up the rhyme of line 6 (c) and thus completing the second quatrain, now enters into an interlocking couplet with the final line 9 (also c). This concluding couplet ix

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gives a sense of closure, as couplets often do—one augmented by the extra (hexametric) length of line 9 (an “alexandrine”). Thus, although this last line also repeats a rhyme unexpectedly, it is not destabilizing; it wraps up the entire stanza. To avoid too much closure, though, in the first line of a stanza, a relative pronoun often refers back to the preceding stanza, or a word or phrase is repeated from it. Because of its complexity and the attachment of Spenser’s name to it, the presence of this stanza in a later author’s work is a sure sign of influence, direct or indirect. The Spenserian stanza was imitated by many poets, both major and minor, perhaps most successfully by Keats in “The Eve of St. Agnes” and Tennyson in “The Choric Song of the Lotos-Eaters.”

3. The Faerie Queene, Book One Book One, The Legend of Holiness, presents a mutually enriching amalgam of discourses because its religious allegory is abstract and often complex and debatable, whereas its story appeals to the emotions, including some of the simplest and most basic ones. To the general public, the first book of The Faerie Queene has furnished quotations to copy into highschool yearbooks and subjects for Mardi Gras floats and children’s plays and stories. This Introduction will alternate brief essays on relevant topics with a plot-centered commentary that proceeds more or less chronologically through the poem.

4. Spenser’s Religious Milieu While romance materials like love and combat are relatively timeless, a religious theme is inevitably inflected by the surrounding culture. Since the subject of Book One is holiness (whatever that may mean, be it wholeness, sanctification, or a true faith), it is enriched by a familiarity with the religious situation at the time Spenser was writing. In the Reformation, various sects in various nations of Western Europe seceded from the once hegemonic Roman Catholic Church in order to regain the purity of the primitive church and of the Bible on which it was supposedly founded. One important disagreement was over the proportion of divine versus human causes of salvation. To oversimplify a bit, the Catholic Church said that mankind must earn heaven and even day-today forgiveness by exerting free will, whereas the original Protestant reformers retorted that free will is “vaine” (as in x.1: “If any strength we have, it is to ill, / But all the good is Gods, both power and eke will”) and that we obtain heaven by unmerited grace caused by God’s arbitrary election (ix.53; x.57). This debate will recur like a leitmotif of this Introduction. By Spenser’s time, England had become Protestant and was

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destined to remain so, though constant vigilance was required to keep it that way. The last Catholic monarch was “bloody” Mary Tudor, who died in 1558 when Spenser was a child. Elizabeth, a moderate and evasive Protestant, ascended the throne, and she ruled throughout the rest of Spenser’s life. But sixteenth-century Englishmen continued to strive with their Catholic foes at home and abroad, both with arms and with arguments. The popes had denied Elizabeth’s right to the throne and absolved in advance anyone who would assassinate her. On at least two occasions, Spain tried to reconquer England for the papacy. Continually, from the 1580s on, Catholic missionaries skulked around England hoping to win converts and to give the existing Catholics spiritual support (Haigh, 201–5). Spenser’s Archimago—an evil enchanter who keeps appearing in Book One and the first eight cantos of Book Two—may symbolize on the political level one such missionary, since he has a breviary and says “Hail Marys” in Latin. The Reformation conflicts emerged within Protestantism itself regarding how many of the old ways and beliefs Englishmen should discard and how many they should retain. Factions were starting to coalesce, which in the seventeenth century would polarize in the English Civil War. Some disagreements were as follows: about foreign policy—militant antiCatholicism versus isolationism and a live-and-let-live attitude; about worship—all the features that later came to be polarized as Low Church versus Anglican or High Church, such as plain versus ornate churches, “pastors” or “ministers” wearing plain black clothing versus “priests” wearing vestments, and preaching and Bible reading versus emphasis on the sacraments; about governance—“puritan” or, as they were more frequently called, “precisian” congregations taking considerable initiative (Collinson, 1985, 189–93), versus an established Church under bishops and a sovereign who replaced the pope as Supreme Governor of the Church; and about anthropology—divine predestination and grace versus human free will as causes of salvation. As to the last issue, a few silent or isolated conservatives, including Queen Elizabeth and Richard Hooker, retained a certain limited trust in human agency—though none dared call it “free will,” which was a rallying cry of the Catholics—and they always stipulated the help of divine grace (Lake, 192–7). This minority was stigmatized under the label of Lutherans (Collinson, 1967, 29–37). In the last quarter of Book One (x–xii), we will see Spenser suddenly preaching good deeds as the ticket to heaven and thus sharing these relatively conservative beliefs of Queen Elizabeth and her small party. Against these few was a vocal and powerful majority designated as Calvinists. Its pillars were those who had fled to Calvin’s Geneva to escape Mary’s persecution, but who returned upon Elizabeth’s accession, bringing radical religious ideas and their own

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glossed translation of Scripture: the Geneva Bible, which was to become important for Spenser. In the first eight or nine cantos of Book One, Spenser attacks Roman Catholicism. This stance would seem to put him in the Calvinist, or “precisian” camp. Perhaps he reverses himself in Canto Ten in order to shake the reader out of the sin of intolerance; perhaps, as I will suggest later, the hero Redcrosse has entered a new phase of religious experience. Finally, in sixteenth-century English society, antipapal rhetoric was part of the standard political discourse of the day, like anti-Communist rhetoric in the 1950s. Almost every Englishman— however conservative his personal practices and beliefs often were— railed against “popery.” One reason was that it was associated with foreign control—the pope and Philip of Spain, bloody Mary’s hated consort, which royal couple may be symbolized on the political level in Canto Eight under the persons of Duessa and Orgoglio (Collinson 1985, 175, 184; Marotti, 1; Watkins, 118).

5. The Proem The introductory section of Book One is called by scholars its Proem. Each book of The Faerie Queene has one. Every other proem extols the virtue that is the alleged theme of its book, called its “titular virtue”; but the first proem never mentions holiness, nor any other religious topic. It deals instead with issues affecting the entire poem: namely its genre and its place among Spenser’s works, its leading characters, and its relation to the current monarch. It thereby foretells that the poem as a whole will not be as religious as is The Legend of Holiness. To take the last issue first, Spenser extols in awestruck, incantatory terms his sovereign Queen Elizabeth, asking her as another “Goddesse” to join the Muses, Cupid, Venus, and Mars in inspiring him (Proem, 4). Flattery of a ruler was characteristic of classical literature and even more so of Renaissance literature. Spenser asks one of the Muses (it is not clear which one) to bring him material on Tanaquill, another name for Gloriana, who is the Faerie Queen of the poem’s title. This numinous female is the “type,” in the world and time of the poem, of Queen Elizabeth in Spenser’s time (Proem, 4; see ACH, note ad loc.). Surprisingly, she proves to be an elusive figure, presented, if at all, chiefly through the speeches of other characters.

6. Genre Most of the first proem is taken up in one way or another with genre. Changes in literary terminology have obscured what Spenser is telling us

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about genre, both here and in the “Letter of the Authors” (now called the “Letter to Raleigh”). Yet in order to harbor the right expectations, we must know what kind of literature we have in hand. By invoking the Muses (Proem, 2), Spenser announces his present genre to be that of the epic—or so he has usually been understood. He has progressed from the pastoral genre, “oaten reedes,” in his Shepheardes Calender (1579) to “trumpets stearne,” whatever they might metonymize. This was Virgil’s career pattern, from the Eclogues to the Aeneid. Indeed, Spenser translates almost verbatim those autobiographical lines, which were then thought to constitute the beginning of the Aeneid and printed as such (see note ad loc.), but which are now recognized as a later interpolation. He thus announces himself to be the English Virgil. Virgil too extolled his ruler, Augustus. But the term “epic” was not much used by Elizabethan critics and never by Spenser, nor did they have any other term of comparably specific function, such as the French chanson de geste; they used the broader term “heroic poem.” In the “Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser labels the works he wants us to see as his models simply as “historical” poems, which could include Arthurian romance (see SE, “Heroic Poem Before Spenser” and “Heroic Poem Since Spenser”). When he says both here and in the “Letter” that his hero is Prince Arthur, and an Arthur whose principal motive is romantic love, he definitely classes his poem as being a romance as well as an epic, thus including romance with the epic as a subcategory of the heroic or historical poem. The two genres also intertwine in the genre romanzo, or romanceepic, which was practiced by his avowed Italian predecessors Ariosto and Tasso—avowed explicitly in the “Letter” and implicitly here by his epic proposition (statement of his subject matter) as “Fierce warres and faithfull loves” (Proem, 1.9), echoing Ariosto’s similar proposition and significantly expanding Virgil’s proposition, “arms and the man I sing” (see note ad loc.). Nowadays we can see that the pervasive genre of The Faerie Queene is chivalric romance—adorned with some of the trappings of the epic, such as epic similes and invocations to the Muses. It is not Spenser (except perhaps in Book Two) but Milton who is the real English Virgil. The minimal recipe for a romance plot is a love interest and the testing of the hero’s worth by physical combat: again, “Fierce warres and faithfull loves.” The basic plot is a quest—a plot that can include combat but that also entails a variety of characters and settings as well as the education of the hero (cf. H. Cooper, 7–15). If the romance is long, as is The Faerie Queene, the plot can become extremely complicated by deferrals, flashbacks, and inset narratives, which are themselves short romances. Prince Arthur is the overall hero, whose quest is to find and earn the hand of

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Gloriana, the queen of Faerie Land (Proem, 2; ix.6–17). Since the poem is unfinished, he never fulfills his quest, but he helps others fulfill theirs. Each book is itself an inset romance, the hero of which exhibits, sometimes imperfectly, a different virtue: Holiness, Temperance, Chastity, Friendship, Justice, and Courtesy. Redcrosse is the hero of Book One; his quest is to kill the dragon that has occasioned the imprisonment of Una’s parents, Adam and Eve, the king and queen of Eden (“Letter”; vii.44; II.i.1.4–5). Within any romance, episodes often succeed one another without the “horizontal” laws of causation—those familiar from our ordinary existence, such as “action affects character and character affects action”; rather, they are caused from above and they unfold in the way someone wishes. The author may shape them into an allegory; author and reader want the entertainment of an emotional rollercoaster ending in wish fulfillment; and society wants a reenactment of its rituals in a glamorous light (Benson, 72–4; Frye, 47–50). Because the aim is entertainment, incidents partake of the erotic, the violent, the coincidental, the mysterious, and in some romances the fantastic. Romance differs from epic in that it regards love as at least potentially ennobling: as Spenser says, “love does alwaies bring forth bounteous [i.e., virtuous] deeds” (III.i.49). The best knight and the most beautiful and virtuous lady are meant for each other (IV.v.1). Romances tend to end happily for the hero and heroine; this is the element of wish fulfillment. To merit this outcome, the protagonists do not have to be perfect. Many romance protagonists, though high minded, commit occasional sins and make occasional mistakes; they are saved in the end by repentance, luck, and mercy. In these cases, romance evokes wonder not so much at the magnitude of their virtues as at the world around them—a wonder that says, “Isn’t it amazing how things work out for the best?” The dramatis personae consist of young heroes and heroines—the men physically invincible and everyone good looking—older people who exist only to interact (for better or worse) with the young, and double-dyed villains. The main characters are aristocrats, however much their birth may be hidden by circumstance; people who are truly lower class are portrayed condescendingly at best. Romance oscillates between the idyllic world and the nightmare world, between the healthful, beautiful landscape or the harmonious court and the dungeon or the cave (Frye, 53, 58). The settings are temporally, spatially, or socially remote; indeed, The Faerie Queene is set almost exclusively in Faerie Land (Davis, 5). Renaissance critics charged the genre romance with a looseness that was moral as well as aesthetic—too much sex and violence. Spenser shows he was aware of such charges when he strangely includes Contemplation, a seemingly reliable spokesman, who categorically condemns

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both combat and love (x.60, 62)—at least for the elderly. Moreover, Spenser strove to raise Book One above the limitations of romance: the quest is to kill a dragon, not a man; the heroine is pure, inspiring, and religiously symbolic; and extramarital sex is painted in the blackest of terms. This must be part of what Spenser means when he promises that his song will “moralize” his subjects, war and love (Proem, 1.9; see note ad loc.).

7. Allegory Allegory and irony were lumped by the Middle Ages as alieniloquium— “otherspeech,” saying one thing and meaning another; it is logical that otherspeech included irony, whether the verbal irony of a sophisticate saying the opposite of what is meant or the dramatic irony of an ingenu unknowingly saying something stupid, like Redcrosse’s boast—“Vertue gives herself light, through darkenesse for to wade”—of which more below. Allegory is difficult to define in a general sense. It was defined by Spenser and most of his contemporaries so broadly as to include any story that has a moral, and in this sense allegory is almost omnipresent. Spenser says in his “Letter to Raleigh” that romance can and should be moralized by allegory, though he puts it the other way round: that moral precepts should be embodied in a “delightful” story. Accordingly, Una is said to symbolize Truth as her opponent Duessa symbolizes Falsehood (ii.Arg.; iii.Arg.; iii.6.5; viii.1.4; viii.49.4). Some of the actions and relations of these two antipodal women make sense only when they are seen politically and precisely as the true and the false churches, or Protestantism and Catholicism. If Duessa did not symbolize something evil, Redcrosse would be sinning only venially in transferring his affections from the supposedly promiscuous Una to her. Besides good and bad women, Book One also contains other moral oppositions: good and bad wells, cups, books, trees, garlands, dragons, castles, hermits, and fasting. While Elizabethans with their broader definition of allegory probably would have called this pattern allegorical as well, it is not necessarily so, demanding only comparison and contrast. This habit of using a given image in both a good and a bad sense Spenser found in the Bible, as it was understood from the Middle Ages to his own day, and it is an important clue to meaning throughout The Faerie Queene. Such allegory as is important to understanding the plot can be appreciated without looking for symbolism of specific historical persons and events—except for Redcrosse’s symbolism of Christ on the third day of his fight with the dragon. For example, Una can be read simply as a typical good woman who redeems her man. Duessa, however, as we have

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seen, cannot be read simply as the typical bad woman, though she often represents that as well, as when she faints to interrupt her lover’s train of thought. Personification is presenting an abstraction as if it were a character. Personification-allegory (for example, the personification Despaire) is easy to decode, since the subject is stated in the name. The political allegory, on the other hand, requires knowledge of history; except for that of Duessa and the controversial contrast between the discourse and lifestyles of Britons and Faeries, of the New Jerusalem and Cleopolis, it is a frill, not necessary to the coherence of the plot of Book One. Even less necessary are analogies to specific people in the real world, as in a key-novel; fascinating though it was to Elizabethan readers, the political level is flickering and inconsistent, generating arbitrary equations. My notes generally avoid the political and biographical allegory, except for the anti-Catholic satire and the rare references to Queen Elizabeth. The Bible, on the other hand, though a vast subject, is a single, physical book and one well supplied over the centuries with interpretive tools. Though as an educated man Spenser read his Bible and commentaries thereon in Latin, he also used English Bibles that were essentially the same as ours today, and one of them included a commentary in English: the Geneva gloss. Even without much background, one can recognize or look up in a concordance allusions and analogies to the English Bible, though one may need to look at unfamiliar parts of it or even its apocrypha. Redcrosse and Arthur, in their respective duels with the giant Orgoglio (vii.7–15; viii.2–25), are conditional parallels (that is, parallels with significant contrasts) to David and Goliath (1 Sam. 17). Such analogies with historical personages in the Bible are called figurae, or types; another instance is when Redcrosse becomes a Christ figure (on Day Three, xi.52–3). According to the “Letter,” examples—and so any stories that could conceivably convey morals—are another kind of allegory; types and examples represent the most concrete and subtle kinds; and sometimes, unlike personifications, they can be difficult to decode when details do not correspond or even conspicuously contrast. Spenser hints that the Bible is a major target of allusion when he says in the “Letter” that the armor Una brings to Redcrosse symbolizes the armor of the Christian man described by St. Paul in Ephesians (6.11, 14–7). If only for this piece of information, the “Letter” must be read—even though it is often confusing and sometimes at odds with the text, e.g., it makes the daunting and misleading claim that the entire poem is a continued allegory; it alone recounts the symbolic knighting of Redcrosse and the beginning of his alliance with Una. The Bible is not merely a source; it forms a good

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clue to the allegorical interpretation of Book One. It is rarely relevant to succeeding books of the poem, however, because they are broadly humanistic in viewpoint.

8. Sources If the pervasive genre of the Legend of Holiness is romance, as Spenser’s eighteenth-century critics perceived, then his most important subtexts or global sources are the romances. Spenser explicitly invokes within the text the Arthur story and the St. George legend (preserved most conveniently for us in The Golden Legend, by Jacobus de Voragine); but he treats them so freely (e.g., Arthur’s original beloved was Guinevere, and the original St. George was not interested in marrying the princess) that he must have cited them mainly to lend the luster of their famous and nationally prominent names to his two heroes (St. George was the patron saint of England’s elite and chivalric Order of the Garter). Medieval chivalric romances—in prose and in verse—available to Tudor readers include Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur (mid-fifteenth century), as well as Chaucer’s Knight’s Tale and Squire’s Tale (late fourteenth century) and a host of others now neglected. Romances written in England in Spenser’s time include the almost-contemporaneous Arcadia by Sidney, which was first published posthumously the same year as The Faerie Queene, but circulated in manuscript before then (like The Faerie Queene, imbued with moral idealism and occasionally rising to epic grandeur, although it is a romance more pastoral than chivalric); Lyly’s Euphues (1578, 1580); Lodge’s Rosalynde (1590); and the twenty romances of Robert Greene. Four English verse romances with allegorical characters who sometimes enact episodes of continuous allegory include The Example of Virtue by Stephen Hawes (1511) and, less similar, his Passetyme of Pleasure (1509), as well as two originally Burgundian allegorical romances: The Travayled Pilgrim (1569), translated by Stephen Bateman or Batman (1569) from the French romance Le Chevalier délibéré (1483), by Olivier de la Marche; and The Voyage of the Wandering Knight (1581), translated by William Goodyear from the French romance Le Voyage du Chevalier errant (1557), by Jean Cartigny. These four romances closely resemble Book One in their addiction to allegory—more closely than do the Renaissance Italian romance-epics. For example, Hawes portrays an allegorical female giving the hero the Christian’s armor allegorized by St. Paul so that he can fight a symbolic dragon in order to win an allegorical princess. On the other hand it was the Italians, and not the English or the Burgundians, who were the first to dignify their romances, as both Spenser and Sidney do,

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with many conspicuous classical structures, motifs, and allusions. The Italians in fact incorporate even more epic elements than does Spenser, chiefly the theme of the destinies of nations decided in large-scale battles and in councils divine and human. The most famous Italian romanceepics are Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso and Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata and Rinaldo, all cited prominently in the “Letter” and imitated conspicuously in Books Three and Four. Tasso’s Gerusalemme contains some allegory, and Tasso’s own commentary imposed it in other places; Ariosto’s poem—containing occasional moral reflections but basically fanciful and humorous—had allegory imposed upon it by its commentators. And, finally, the Book of Revelation furnishes models for the two women who compete for possession of Redcrosse’s soul—both the Whore of Babylon and the true church as the Bride of Christ (Rev. 21; Canto Twelve). As for local sources, Spenser alludes piecemeal to the Bible and the classics throughout The Legend of Holiness in ways too various to mention here (for some of them, see the notes). Almost every reference to the classics in the Legend of Holiness is disparaging.

9. Romance as Biblical Allegory: Duessa versus Una Una’s rival Duessa is essential to the plot, and she is both biblical and allegorical. Duessa deviously introduces herself as a romance damsel in distress, but she eventually turns out to be the biblical figure known as the Whore of Babylon (Rev. 17–19.3)—a figure that Protestants read as a symbol of the Catholic Church of their day. From Cantos Two to Six, Redcrosse is completely deceived, whereas the sixteenth-century Protestant reader could probably identify Duessa from her initial description (ii.13). At least by Canto Seven she is readily identifiable when she appears with a golden cup, riding on a seven-headed beast as the Whore does in Rev. 17.3–5. Finally, Duessa is explicitly labeled the “scarlot Whore” in viii.29. Spenser thus enriches the love interest of romance with a conflict of creeds. Spenser’s allegorical characters are interrelated by parallel and contrast, and they often constitute aspects of Duessa. Three bad female characters are analogues, unfoldings, refractions, or conditional parallels of Duessa. Lucifera is represented as her friend; like her, she is beautiful (in her flashy way) and powerful. She contrasts with Duessa in her virginity (iv.8.5). Since she symbolizes pride in the procession of the Seven Deadly Sins (iv.16.1–2; 17.1; 18.1), we infer that she is just too proud to submit herself to a man, and therefore that her virginity reflects no special credit on her (see also Mirabella in VI.vii.27–viii.30). We infer too that she represents pride in general because of her role in the sin parade and because

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she manifests, on the one hand, social pride (see, for example, iv.10; 14) and, on the other hand, pride against God in bearing the religiously resonant name “Lucifera” and employing Satan as her coachman. Abessa and Corceca are not friends of Duessa, but are still refractions of her; they highlight what Protestants considered to be the faults of the Roman Catholic rank and file—nuns and the laity (Canto Three). Una too generates conditional parallels—the females that operate the House of Holiness; but this must suffice to exemplify the relatedness of Spenser’s allegorical characters. Some such heroine as Una was dictated to Spenser, first, by his choice of Duessa as the false church seducing the hero, which required a portrayal of the true church; and second, by his overall project of redeeming romance, which meant providing a positive picture of woman and of love—ideally, a heroine capable of inspiring the hero to save his soul. Una derives from and alludes to several previous figures and types of figure, such as the Woman Clothed with the Sun in Rev. 12, and the Bride in both the Song of Solomon and in Rev. 20. Her most influential and least appreciated predecessor is the biblical personification Wisdom or Sapience (as in Proverbs 7–9, also described in Spenser’s Hymne of Heavenly Beauty, 183–259), invoked, for example, when Una says, “. . . wisedom warnes, whilest foot is in the gate, / To stay the steppe” (i.13). Sapience also dominates the deuterocanonical books Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus (now called Sirach)—books that were still included in Protestant Bibles in Spenser’s day, though not today. Besides being a literal heroine—beautiful, virtuous, and wise—Una bears two allegorical roles. When she is with Redcrosse, she exercises a private influence as his guide, the true church (as when she seeks him, e.g., iii.Arg.); or more inwardly, his own divine spark, or the indwelling Christ or Holy Spirit (as when she asserts that Redcrosse is among the “chosen” in refutation of Despaire: ix.53; see also i.13). Similarly, Wisdom is betrothed to a human individual—Solomon, the fictional speaker of the book of Wisdom (8:2, 9, 16, 18; 9). Secondly, Una exercises a public role as religious truth or the true church in the world when she is off on her own and meets various unenlightened creatures, especially when she endeavors to convert the Satyrs (Canto Six), whoever they may be. The Satyrs rescue Una from Sansloy’s sexual assault. All Una’s adventures are in fact dominated by a series of champions—real or pretended, superhuman, human, three-quarters human, half-human, or animal. One possible meaning of this pattern is that the true church needs believers and, if possible, champions who, like Satyrane, are at least three-quarters rational, in order to continue to exist among humankind. Una’s kinship with animals and nature, while a charming and indeed a mythic touch,

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remains a mystery. Una can be deceived, at least temporarily, by Archimago (iii.26–40); she needs to be counseled out of her despair by Arthur (vii.38–42); despite being “borne of hevenly berth,” (x.9), she has human parents—Adam and Eve (i.5; vii.43; xii.26). These three human touches force us to identify her, at least in her public role, as a human organization, a church, not truth or wisdom in the abstract. Her liability to deception (though not to sin) illustrates Christ’s warning that “false Christs shall rise, and false prophets, . . . to deceive if it were possible the very elect” (Mark 13.22, Geneva version). Thus Spenser elevated the love interest of romance; he portrayed a good, redemptive, and symbolic damsel; furthermore, he added a biblical symmetry and an apocalyptic contrast by balancing her with a bad damsel symbolizing the false church.

10. Romance as Biblical Allegory: Redcrosse’s Adventures Redcrosse is not a static personification of Holiness; he is an Everyman or, more specifically, an Everyknight. Every knight aspires to prove himself. Redcrosse has more to prove because he started out as a “clownish young man,” a “hick.” What theme, if any, vertically determines the sequence of Redcrosse’s adventures? In the middle episodes, Spenser wants the readers to be almost as confused as is Redcrosse. But the Despaire episode (ix.21–54; x.1) finally reveals the diagnosis: that Redcrosse has all along exhibited subtle kinds of pride against God—kinds based on doctrinal errors and fostered by though not limited to Catholicism. Despaire’s project is inducing knights to commit suicide, and he has recently succeeded with Sir Terwin. Let us concentrate on what is wrong with Despaire’s arguments from any Christian’s point of view. Catholics as well as Protestants would notice that he emphasizes God’s justice to the exclusion of his forgiveness for those who repent. Despaire’s rhetorical question, “Shall he thy sins up in his knowledge fold, / And guilty be of thine impietie?” (ix.47), implies the answer “No,” whereas a fully Christian answer would be “Yes,” in the sense that God in Christ assumed and expiated mankind’s guilt by dying on the cross. By accusing Redcrosse of betraying Una with Duessa, Despaire leads Redcrosse to at least the beginning of repentance: “The knight was much enmoved with his speach, . . . Well knowing trew all, that he did reherse” (ix. 48). When Una interrupts her knight’s resulting attempt at suicide, she cries, “In heavenly mercies hast thou not a part? . . . Where justice growes, there grows eke greter grace” (ix.53). In other words, “It doesn’t all depend upon you.” Similarly, when the poet-speaker moralizes in x.1 on the previous action (the first stanza of a canto is often devoted to such a

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retrospective moralization; see vii.1; viii.1; ix.1), he declares “fleshly might, / And vaine assuraunce of mortality” to be useless in avoiding sin and achieving virtue because “All the good is God’s, both power and eke will.” Through grace, however, we can gain the victory over “spiritual foes” that baffle “fleshly might.” In this categorical statement, Spenser parts company with Catholics, who attribute something, at least, to human agency. To exaggerate slightly, Catholics say “salvation depends upon me,” whereas Protestants say “salvation depends upon God.” Redcrosse learns to say to himself, unheroically but truly, “It doesn’t matter if I can’t handle it, because everything does not depend upon me.” Armed with the doctrines and advice laid down by ix.53 and x.1, let us turn our attention backward in the story to Redcrosse’s adventures in Cantos Two, Four, and Five; they are typical of romance, but we can now see that they are subtly critiqued and corrected by the Bible, especially by St. Paul. To his credit, Redcrosse often fends off the initial and obvious temptations; but he falls to subtler, more finely tuned temptations. He fends off Archimago’s temptations to lust (i.45–55) and falls only to Archimago’s temptation to jealousy (ii.3–9). He fends off Despaire’s hedonistic motives for suicide (ix.39–41) and succumbs only to moral despair (ix.43, 45–47). Also to his credit, it is not until he falls before the giant Orgoglio in Canto Seven that he is clearly defeated in battle; it is not until he fornicates with Duessa (vii.2–7) that he is “disgraced” in terms of the monogamy demanded by chivalric love etiquette. In these middle cantos, his adventures are just slightly off-color. His separation from Una leads to these; but even before that he reveals himself to be a “man . . . that boasts of fleshly might / And vaine assuraunce of mortality” (x.1.1–2) when, warned by Una to stay out of Error’s den, he replies, “Vertue gives her selfe light, through darkenesse for to wade” (i.12.9), and the poet comments, “his glistring armour made / A litle glooming light, much like a shade” (i.14.4–5). Redcrosse is saying heroically but erroneously, “Everything depends upon me, and I can handle it.” As a result of responding to challenges from Sansfoy and Sansjoy, he gets himself involved in chivalrous liaisons with women who turn out to be bad—Duessa and Lucifera. During the joust with Sansjoy (v.1–15), Redcrosse is inspired by Duessa’s cry to gain the upper hand and strike the crucial blow; but she is really cheering for his opponent, or at least hedging her bets by being ambiguous. Lucifera’s sinfulness is at first perceived by Redcrosse (though it is chiefly because she has slighted him): he “thought all their glory vaine in knightly vew, / And that great Princesse too exceeding prowd, / That to strange knight no better countenance allowed” (iv.15). Yet through the chivalric necessity of jousting

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with his challenger Sansjoy—a dubious necessity, despite the apparent endorsement of the poet-speaker (v.8.1; 9.1), since the prizes are Duessa and the shield of Sansfoy (v.1–15)—he gets drawn into Lucifera’s community; for after his uncertain victory (v.13, 15), he accepts a ride in Lucifera’s chariot (v.16), in which position, we recall, Lucifera is accompanied by Satan and represents pride served by the other six deadly sins. Redcrosse finally leaves Lucifera’s castle on the prudential warning of the Dwarf to avoid the temporal ruin that a sight of her dungeon portends. Conquering Sansjoy and escaping from Lucifera’s obvious form of pride, without paying her usual price, leads Redcrosse into two subtler forms of pride. The first is complacency, or what the Renaissance would have called the vice of “security,” or spiritual laziness: “Everything depends upon me, and I’ve done enough; I deserve a break.” Various religious thinkers, ancient and modern, have warned that acquiring a virtue or performing a good deed can lead to spiritual pride of one sort or another. In this complacent mood, he stops for rest; he takes his armor off—an act that, in The Faerie Queene, usually symbolizes bad relaxation, especially in the case of this armor, which is the armor of a Christian man in Ephesians 6.11, 14–7. He drinks from the well of the lazy nymph. The nymph parallels Redcrosse at this moment, in that she “sat down to rest in middest of the race.” Drinking of her well or fountain makes him lazy, thus expressing and intensifying his complacency and desire for some rest and relaxation. Duessa catches up with him, and it is in this mood that he fornicates with her (vii.2–7). Redcrosse himself, to whom “lust” was once “unwonted” (i.49.1), would have condemned this act earlier on; and it was for her alleged sexual infidelity to him that he abandoned Una (ii.5–6). Incidentally, we know that this sexual act is consummated, contrary to some recent doubts, because he is said to be “careless of his health,” which implies penetration. Because his partner is Duessa, this union allegorizes joining the Roman Catholic Church and renouncing the Protestant Church, which is represented by Una. The second form of pride is his habitual combativeness, his can-do attitude, his eagerness—usually a virtue in the romance hero—to prove his supposed abilities, which he tremulously tries to resume when challenged by Orgoglio. Orgoglio as a giant is not only a typical romance opponent but a symbol for Redcrosse’s basic sin, or ruling passion—moral overconfidence, as if to say, “I am a moral giant: everything depends upon me and I can handle it.” The giant exhibits “presumption of his matchlesse might” (vii.10.3); his “boasted sire” is “blustring Æolus” (vii.9.2). These traits help us to see Orgoglio as a projection of the bad side of Redcrosse, whom we have seen to represent the “man who boasts of fleshly might / And vaine assuraunce of mortality” (x.1, my emphasis). Because its possessor

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“yields” to “spiritual foes,” presumably Orgoglio and Despaire, we can see that “fleshly might” in these contexts is used in the peculiarly Pauline sense of, not just the body and the passions, but even the “will” (x.1.9)— everything in mankind outside of divine grace or apart from the spirit of God (e.g., 1 Cor. 1.29; Rom. 8.9, 12, 13). There are of course many meanings to Orgoglio, but it seems to me that this Pauline meaning of flesh as one’s own moral strength is primary, while those representing his earthliness and fleshliness are literal and ancillary. Spenser was not inept but perceptive to tempt Redcrosse with two kinds of pride. Later, Arthur vanquishes the giant as a romance hero should and as David did Goliath (1 Sam. 17), creating a contrast of bad and good giantfighters. The knights differ principally in regard to their armor and especially their shields. Redcrosse has laid aside his armor, which includes his shield, glossed by Ephesians as the shield of faith (6.16; see “Letter”); and Orgoglio attacks him “ere he could get his shield.” Now, David took off the armor donated by King Saul, including the shield, when going to meet his giant; but he did so because of his faith, faith in the protection of God (1 Sam. 17.39, 45–6). That which substituted for armor in David’s case is symbolized by armor in Redcrosse’s. This symbolism is continued when Arthur’s armor, especially his shield, is described at laudatory length; ascribed to it are some of the same miracles later said to be wrought by Fidelia, or faith (x.20), so it seems to be related to faith, perhaps as its miraculous result (see note ad loc.). This shield is crucial: it saves Arthur from Duessa’s seven-headed beast and, finally, from Orgoglio himself (viii.18, 19, 20, and 21, mentioned once in each stanza). Despite this humiliating defeat and humbling rescue, in the Despaire episode, Redcrosse still exhibits his can-do attitude when he cries “hence shall I never rest, / Till I that treachours art have heard and tryde” (ix.32); he needs to be and will be humbled again. Medieval and Renaissance readers saw moral presumption and moral despair as related (Torczon); they represent the happy moments and the sad moments of someone who thinks everything depends upon him. As we have seen above, the way to stop these vicious mood swings is a wise passiveness—a dependence on God’s grace both for forgiveness after failure (ix.53) and for help toward success (x.1.6–7). In retrospect, then, the rights and wrongs of Redcrosse’s adventures in these temporarily ambiguous middle cantos can be sorted out. In the House of Holiness in Canto Ten, presented as the normative opposite of Lucifera’s House of Pride, most of the speakers after x.1 are surprisingly Catholic; they tell Redcrosse what he must do to get to heaven: penance (x.27) and good deeds (x.34, 51). This apparent aboutface remains an interpretive problem. We gather that the Calvinist Manifesto of ix.53 (in essence, “God decides who is going to heaven, and you

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are one of them”) and x.1 (in essence, “No human being has the power or the will to do anything good, so when you seemed to do some, it was only God working through you”) applies only to Redcrosse’s adventures so far, exemplifying how and how not to set up a proper relationship with God. Apparently, once one is in a state of grace, as Redcrosse now is, the Catholic ethic of self-help is correct. At a deeper level, Spenser may have planned such a reversal in order to eliminate intolerance and reunite the two denominations, or at least to counter the Romanist charge that Protestants neglect their neighbor’s welfare and focus only on the inner life and on sin. Whatever Spenser’s intention, at least we can infer from the Catholic coloring of almost everything, except the first stanza in Canto Ten, that the anti-Catholic satire is over; religious issues will be ones that Catholics and Protestants have in common—the conquest of evil and Satan. And sure enough, there is no indubitable anti-Catholic satire in the rest of the book except possibly Archimago’s attempt to reclaim Redcrosse for Duessa (xii.24–36). A Christian’s good works are declared meritorious (x.33.9; 34.9; 38.5–6; 51.3–4), as only the Catholics believe they are; moreover it is not Fidelia (faith) or Speranza (hope), but Charissa (charity) and her deputy Mercy who “to heaven [teach] him the ready path” (33.9; 34.9; 51.3–4; see also Amoretti, 68.13–4; and Hymne of Heavenly Love, 169–217). Conversely, the poet-speaker warns that people are damned for lack of charity—“wrath, and hatred” (x.33). This was the belief of Henry VIII. But then we are again told that only the “chosen” can get to heaven (x.57, echoing ix.53)—the Calvinist or extreme Protestant position. The contradiction between charity and predestination as entrance requirements could perhaps be reconciled if one took the mediating position that the source of good deeds, one’s own spontaneous feeling of charity or brotherly love that gets one into heaven, is not selfgenerated but infused by God at his own pleasure—a position expounded by St. Augustine. In the House of Holiness (x.21; 27.9), one is surprised to see Redcrosse despair again—another contradiction and one resolvable as a paradox. As Luther says (Thesis 18 for Heidelberg Disputation, 1518, in Luther, 502), a Christian needs to experience moral despair in order to learn his or her own moral helplessness and need of grace. This time Redcrosse’s suicidal thoughts are thwarted emblematically when he grasps the anchor of Speranza, or hope. Speranza’s anchor may symbolize the advice Una dispensed the first time: the assurance of God’s mercy for repented sin and even—who knows—a Calvinist assurance that he is among the “chosen” (ix.53). Having attained an inspiring vision of heaven (x.57), Redcrosse engages in a complex dialogue about his own aspirations with the Hermit Contemplation. Here too, good deeds, at least of the more worldly and

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spectacular sort, receive endorsement in Cleopolis and from Gloriana, the Faerie Queen who reigns there. To become one of Gloriana’s courtiers in Cleopolis, one must achieve something worthy of fame (x.58–59), whereas to gain entrance to the New Jerusalem, one need not do anything, just be divinely “chosen” and forgiven (x.57). Surprisingly for a Christian mentor, the Hermit says Redcrosse must win fame in Cleopolis before he can go to heaven (x.59–60). The Hermit’s meritocratic discourse here is not that of Christianity, but that of romance and of classical epic. One possible resolution is that the two cities and their contrasting lifestyles are appropriate, respectively, for youth and for old age. Whatever its meaning, this postponement of heaven and the contemplative life prepares us for another postponement: Redcrosse’s announcement that he cannot marry Una now, only become engaged to her, because he has to go back and finish his tour of duty for Gloriana (xii.18; 41). The first postponement also prepares us for the fact that subsequent books of the poem (until the very last stanzas of Book Seven) are not about getting to heaven, but about winning fame (and the hand of one’s beloved ) on this earth. The ambivalent relationship between the cities is paralleled by that of their inhabitants. Even though everyone, including the poet-speaker, calls him an Elf, Redcrosse learns that he is really a Briton (x.60; 64–67). One of the differences is that Elves never get to see the New Jerusalem (52.2–6), whereas qualified Britons are apparently welcome in Cleopolis and in the two holy places, the Mount of Contemplation and the New Jerusalem. Further differences between the races will emerge in Book Two, Canto Ten.

11. Climax Spenser’s choice of a dragon instead of a human as principal antagonist avoids the guilt attendant upon most chivalric battles—a guilt invoked both by Despaire and by the Hermit Contemplation (ix.43.3–6; x.60.8–9). Humans are redeemable and hence cannot be killed without some guilt. Animals such as dragons also yield more readily than do humans to symbolic interpretation. Symbolism brings one sort of grandeur—the grandeur of generality. The phrase “that old Dragon” (Arg.xi) quotes Rev. 20.2: “the dragon that olde serpent which is the devill and Satan.” This means that, on at least one level, Spenser’s dragon represents the devil. This symbolism accords with the fact that Spenser’s dragon occasioned Adam and Eve’s fall, albeit a sinless one, allegorized by their imprisonment in the brazen tower (“Letter”; vii.44). The dragon is killed conclusively, although Archimago and Duessa return to deceive (xii.24–36). Spenser even makes fun of low-class simpletons who think the dragon is still alive (xii.10). At the crucifixion, Christ

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irrevocably bound the devil, according to biblical exegesis and much medieval literature, even though the latter’s subordinates continue to work on earth; at the end of the world, the devil himself, as a dragon, will ultimately be cast by an angel into a lake of fire where he will burn for ever and ever (Rev. 20.10). How can a mere human like Redcrosse kill Satan once and for all and rescue Adam and Eve? The answer must be, as some readers have averred with greater or lesser degrees of emphasis, that at least on the third day Redcrosse somehow transcends mere humanity and is or typifies the god-man Christ. If Redcrosse is overachieving on Day Three by doing what Christ alone could do, perhaps on Day One he is underachieving and showing how vulnerable mankind was when Christ had not yet come. Redcrosse is ignominiously defeated (xi.30.9), so much so that both the dragon and Una believe him to be dead (xi.31–32). The armor that heats up and paradoxically harms him could be shown to symbolize Mosaic law, man’s sole protection against the devil during the period from Moses to Christ. When, on the second morning, he arises refreshed from the well into which the dragon has cast him, the poet-speaker conjectures that either “his baptized hands now greater grew,” or his sword was hardened in “that holy water” (xi.36); in either case, the well symbolizes baptism, the initiatory sacrament. As an individual on the literal level, Redcrosse must have become a Christian long before—certainly when he had “God to frend” (i.28.7), most likely when, as a lowly rustic, he first donned the enchanted armor and “seemed the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady” (“Letter”). It seems as if he has assumed the role of mankind and it is only now, in that role, that he gets baptized or enters the Christian era; for on the second day, Redcrosse achieves more. He finally acts like the good Christian he has become in the House of Holiness; he cannot kill the dragon, but he holds his own against him; he is defeated not by a blow from the dragon, but only by his own weakness (xi.45; 48.9), and nobody thinks he is dead. The balm from the tree that shelters him on the second night is susceptible to several interpretations (e.g., divine grace in general, or the oil imposed at confirmation), each with its own inadequacies; in context, the most convincing interpretation is as the second of the two sacraments recognized by Protestants, namely Holy Communion or the Eucharist. Since the well and the tree both allegorize privileges or necessities, specifically of the Christian, both of them seem to go with Day Two as its frame. Holy Communion also represents a transition to Day Three, in that it effects a union between the Christian and Christ such as could be allegorized, with pardonable exaggeration, by Redcrosse’s becoming Christ on the third day.

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Among the many sources for the dragon fight, especially the victorious third day (e.g., Hawes’s Example of Virtue), there are three fights with a dragon and/or Satan involving a hero who is a holy being or Christ himself: an angel’s imprisonment of “that old Dragon” in Rev. 20.1–3, St. George’s killing of a dragon and rescue of a princess in his Legend, and Christ’s binding of Satan and rescue of Adam and Eve in the Harrowing of Hell. This last event is hinted at in the Bible, briefly mentioned in the Apostle’s Creed, and first narrated in the indubitably apocryphal yet immensely popular Gospel of Nicodemus. Because there are so many retellings of it that Spenser could have known (e.g., Piers Plowman B, Passus 18), I cite parallels from the ultimate source, the Gospel of Nicodemus, in a modern scholarly translation. Just as Redcrosse fights for three days, so Christ harrows Hell during the three days while his body is dead. Just as a watchman on the castle tower heralds Redcrosse (xii.2), so prophets—often troped in the Old Testament as watchmen, sometimes “wayting,” sometimes on towers (e.g., Isa. 21.5–12; Jer. 31.6; Ezek. 3.17, 33.2–7; Hab. 2.1)—herald Christ’s entrance into Hell (James 124–5, Latin A; Greek). Hell’s brazen gates are opened on command (James 133, Latin A; James 134, Latin B). Christ wrestles down Satan and leads out of Hell Adam, Eve, and Old Testament patriarchs and prophets—beneficiaries similar to some of those who emerge from the brazen tower after Redcrosse’s victory (xii.2–5). Christ leads his flock into Paradise—a Paradise explicitly identified in one version (the Greek, James 141) as “Eden.” The Harrowing of Hell gives Christ a chance to battle like a knight. Medieval men retold this apocryphal story endlessly in literature and art—probably because it satisfied their well-known predilection for violence, whereas the Christ portrayed in the gospels must have seemed something of a doormat. A well-intentioned man under Mosaic and/or natural law, a Christian, and Christ: they differ in how far each is a match for the devil. The first two stages are chronological; but the third stage, Christ’s victory, occurred partly at the crucifixion and will occur completely at the end of the world (Rev. 20). Spenser’s climactic incident does not use Christianity to correct romance, but fuses the two traditions through an element of combat that he has managed to find in the Christian tradition, thus giving the story an archetypal resonance.

12. Indeterminacy versus Closure How much of Redcrosse’s victory over the dragon depends upon God, and how much on the knight? To judge from the knight’s strenuous effort on the second day, framed by the help of two magical objects on the

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two nights and assisted by Una’s prayers, it seems to result from a cooperation of the two. But we cannot be sure because Spenser’s report of Una’s answer to this question in the last lines of the canto contains a deliberately ambiguous pronoun: “Then God she praysd, and thankt her faithfull knight, / That had atchievde so great a conquest by his might” —whose might, the knight’s or God’s? (xi.55). It is only in Book Two that Spenser solves this internal debate with a Christian-humanist compromise: in the dragon fight, says the now-perfected Redcrosse, God supplied the power and he the good will (II.i.33). This compromise could represent the solution; but if so, Spenser has deliberately left Book One in indeterminacy because in it, the seemingly normative poetspeaker has said that even one’s good will comes from God (x.1.9). Besides this question of divine versus human causes of salvation, Spenser leaves at least two other questions unanswered: 1) Since fame is the only immortality Faeries have (x.59), whereas Britons, and Britons alone, can go to heaven (x.52.3), what is the relation between Britons and Faeries, between Cleopolis and the New Jerusalem or heaven? 2) Since Book One seems to emphasize heaven and to assign God full responsibility for who gets there, whereas Book Two, as II.i.32–33 indicates, affirms some human role in getting to heaven, what is the difference in outlook between Book One and Book Two? Some critics believe that Book Two, and indeed each succeeding book, presupposes Book One and its Christianity as a foundation, if only because Edmund Spenser was a Christian. But others object that this unifying faith ignores the contradictions between Book One and succeeding books, and the latter’s general tendencies toward the secular, e.g., “Cupid’s wanton snare / As hell she hated, chaste in worke and will” (x.30) versus the poet’s comparison of an angel to Cupid in II.viii.6, and the admission of Cupid to the Garden of Adonis provided he checks his weapons at the door (III.vi.49.8–9). A.S.P. Woodhouse (1949) controversially claimed that Book One and the later books differ as do the realms, respectively, of grace and of nature. This difference is more usefully conceived as that between the viewpoints of a narrowly exclusive Christianity and of a syncretic Christian humanism (Kaske, 1975). The narrowly exclusive Christianity of Book One, be the discourse Catholic or Protestant, is expressed, for example, by Charissa’s hatred of Cupid (x.30), by x.1, and by the Hermit’s “blood can nought but sin, and wars but sorrows yield. . . . As for loose loves they’are vaine, and vanish into nought” (x.60.9; 62.9). It is from the syncretic point of view that Book Two attempts a compromise about free will, and therefore Book Two may not answer every question posed by Book One; e.g., it does not agree and cannot deal with the total bankruptcy of natural man described in x.1.

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While the conquest of the dragon is complete, the free-will debate remains unresolved. Another frustration, for the characters as well as for the reader, is that after the victory celebration, Duessa and her emissary Archimago attempt to claim Redcrosse for Duessa in the presence of Una’s parents. Una exposes their plot and generously exonerates Redcrosse, and her father imprisons Archimago, but the poet warns the reader that Archimago will resurface yet again. Redcrosse is betrothed to Una in a wedding-like ceremony in which the same syncretism of the secular and the sacred that melds romance battles and Christian ones in the dragon fight is exhibited in miniature: in the miraculous infusion of the song of the angels into a love song (xii.29). Another frustration occurs when Redcrosse sojourns with her happily for a time, almost fulfilling the generic romance ending—“And so they got married and lived happily ever after”—but then reveals that they cannot marry for six years, not until Redcrosse shall have finished his suddenly announced tour of duty for the Faerie Queen. Even in this, the most conclusive book of The Faerie Queene, a few threads, both of plot and of meaning, are deliberately left hanging.

Title page to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23081).

TO THE MOST MIGHTIE AND MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE ELIZABETH, BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND, FRANCE AND IRELAND DEFENDER OF THE FAITH &c.

Her most humble Seruant: Ed. Spenser

The first Booke of the Faerie Queene. Contayning

The Legend of the Knight of the Red Crosse, OR

Of Holinesse. 1

Lo I the man, whose Muse whylome1 did maske, As time her taught, in lowly Shephards weeds,2 Am now enforst a farre unfitter taske, For trumpets sterne to chaunge mine Oaten reeds:3 And sing of Knights and Ladies gentle deeds, Whose praises having slept in silence long, Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds4 To blazon broade5 emongst her learned throng: Fierce warres and faithfull loves shall moralize my song.6

1

under the pseudonym Immerito—“unworthy.” “As time her taught” implies that the low persona fits his amateur status and relative youth back then. 3 I.e., to change from pastoral to heroic poetry. Metonymy. 4 areeds: instructs. Spenser adopts the topos of authorial modesty characteristic of almost all of his personas. The “sacred Muse” is Spenser’s usual epithet for the muse (ACH). 5 To blazon broade: to proclaim abroad with a trumpet. 6 I.e., my song shall moralize fierce wars and faithful loves, imparting to these materials of romance a moral dimension, for example by allegory. Direct object comes before verb and subject comes after verb; Spenser often inverts word order.

whylome: a while ago. weeds: clothes. Spenser identifies himself as the man who wrote pastorals, i.e., The Shepheardes Calender, 1579. He echoes what were then thought to be the four autobiographical opening lines of Virgil’s Aeneid, now known to be by a later hand: “Ille ego, qui quondam gracili modulatus avena / carmen, . . . at nunc horrentia martis / arma virumque cano,” etc.: “I am he who once tuned my song on a slender reed [the Eclogues], . . . but now of Mars’ bristling arms I sing and the man who . . . etc.” (trans. ACH). Spenser thus aligns his career with the Virgilian career pattern of first writing eclogues or pastorals, then graduating to heroic poetry. For terms, see Introduction, 6. Spenser’s Muse “did maske . . . in lowly Shephards weeds” because he wrote under the persona of a shepherd and 2

3

4

The Faerie Queene: Book One

2

Helpe then, O holy Virgin chiefe of nyne,1 Thy weaker2 Novice to performe thy will, Lay forth out of thine everlasting scryne3 The antique rolles, which there lye hidden still, Of Faerie knights and fayrest Tanaquill,4 Whom that most noble Briton Prince5 so long Sought through the world, and suffered so much ill, That I must rue his undeserved wrong:6 O helpe thou my weake wit, and sharpen my dull tong.

3

And thou most dreaded impe7 of highest Jove, Faire Venus sonne, that with thy cruell dart At that good knight so cunningly didst rove,8 That glorious fire it kindled in his hart, Lay now thy deadly Heben9 bowe apart, And with thy mother mylde come to mine ayde:10 Come both, and with you bring triumphant Mart,11 In loves and gentle jollities arraid, After his murdrous spoyles and bloudie rage allayd.

1 One of the nine muses, either Clio, Muse of history, or Calliope, the muse of heroic poetry. ACH favors Calliope; he quotes Roche quoting Spenser’s authorized commentator E.K., to the effect that Calliope is “the first glorye of the Heroicall verse” (on Shepheardes Calender, “April,” 100); and The Faerie Queene is a heroic poem. 2 weaker: too weak. 3 scryne: chest, coffer. 4 One of the (rarely used) names for Gloriana, queen of Faerie Land, who in turn represents in the political allegory Queen Elizabeth; see “Letter to Raleigh.” 5 I.e., Arthur. 6 This love quest for Gloriana represents Spenser’s creative rewriting of the Arthur

story, based on folktales of knights seeking elusive fairy mistresses. For Arthur’s account of it, see ix.6–15. 7 impe: offspring. 8 rove: shoot. 9 Heben: ebony. 10 If Cupid lays down his weapons, Spenser usually portrays him in a positive light, as here; the armed Cupid, however, is either ambivalent, as he was to Arthur (line 3), or downright malicious. 11 Mars, from the oblique case of his name in Latin: Mars, Martis, etc. Like Cupid, he has here been domesticated. “Mars and Venus represent respectively war and love, the two . . . subjects of the poem” (ACH).

Proem

4

1

5

And with them eke, O Goddesse heavenly bright,1 Mirrour of grace and Majestie divine,2 Great Ladie of the greatest Isle, whose light Like Phoebus lampe3 throughout the world doth shine, Shed thy faire beames into mine feeble eyne, And raise my thoughtes too humble and too vile, To thinke of that true glorious type of thine,4 The argument of mine afflicted stile:5 The which to heare, vouchsafe, O dearest dread6 a while.

eke: also; Goddesse heavenly bright: Queen Elizabeth, who, like the Muse, can inspire mortals to write poetry. She too is a “Goddesse,” a fairly common term for monarchs in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. 2 Cf. Wisd. 7.26: “For she is the brightnes of the everlasting light, the undefiled mirroure of the majestie of God” (ACH, quoting the Geneva Bible, as I do throughout this edition). Spenser often links both Elizabeth and Una to the biblical personification Wisdom or Sapience; see Introduction, 9. Elizabeth is first a pagan, then a JudeoChristian deity. 3 Phoebus lampe: the sun.

4

Type is meant in the biblical sense, figura or prototype; i.e., a person analogous to you, my queen, in the past. Spenser means Gloriana, who is the “argument” of the poem: i.e., the titular heroine, the Faerie Queen. As the poem progresses, however, Gloriana is referred to less and less; and she appears in propria persona only in the “Letter to Raleigh,” and in Arthur’s problematic dream (ix.2–16). 5 mine afflicted stile: my humble writing style, to which the poet asks the Queen to listen. His style is humble or afflicted because, according to him, it is not very good—the modesty topos again. 6 O dearest dread: O you whom I both love and fear. Oxymoron. Also applied to women who are loved in a sexual way.

Canto One The Patrone of true Holinesse, Foule Errour doth defeate: Hypocrisie him to entrappe, Doth to his home entreate.

1

A Gentle Knight was pricking on the plaine, Ycladd1 in mightie armes and silver shielde, Wherein old dints of deepe woundes did remaine, The cruell markes of many a bloody fielde; Yet armes till that time did he never wield: His angry steede did chide his foming bitt, As much disdayning to the curbe to yield: Full jolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt, As one for knightly giusts2 and fierce encounters fitt.

2

And on his brest a bloodie Crosse he bore, The deare remembrance of his dying Lord, For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore, And dead as living ever him ador’d: Upon his shield the like was also scor’d, For soveraine hope, which in his helpe he had: Right faithfull true he was in deede and word, But of his cheere3 did seeme too solemne sad; Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.4

3

Upon a great adventure he was bond, That greatest Gloriana to him gave, That greatest Glorious Queene of Faery lond, To winne him worshippe, and her grace to have, Which of all earthly thinges he most did crave;

1 Ycladd: clad; “y-” is the sign of the perfect passive participle. “The Letter to Raleigh” identifies Redcrosse’s armor as the armor of the Christian man described by Paul in Eph. 6.11–17.

2

giusts: jousts. cheere: behavior, here chiefly facial expression. 4 ydrad: dreaded. 3

6

Canto One

7

And ever as he rode his hart did earne,1 To prove his puissance in battell brave Upon his foe, and his new force to learne; Upon his foe, a Dragon horrible and stearne. 4

A lovely Ladie rode him faire beside, Upon a lowly Asse more white then snow, Yet she much whiter, but the same did hide Under a vele, that wimpled2 was full low, And over all a blacke stole shee did throw, As one that inly mournd: so was she sad, And heavie sate upon her palfrey slow: Seemed in heart some hidden care she had, And by her in a line3 a milkewhite lambe she lad.

5

So pure and innocent, as that same lambe, She was in life and every vertuous lore,4 And by descent from Royall lynage came Of ancient Kinges and Queenes, that had of yore Their scepters stretcht from East to Westerne shore, And all the world in their subjection held, Till that infernall feend with foule uprore Forwasted all their land, and them expeld: Whom to avenge, she had this knight from far compeld.

6

Behind her farre away a Dwarfe5 did lag, That lasie seemd in being ever last, Or wearied with bearing of her bag Of needments at his backe. Thus as they past, The day with cloudes was suddeine overcast, And angry Jove an hideous storme of raine

1

earne: yearn. wimpled: falling in folds around her face and neck. 3 in a line: on a lead. The lamb is never mentioned again; therefore it must be purely emblematic. Literally it derives from the lamb that the princess leads with her for their mutual sacrifice to the dragon in the St. George legend; see Jacobus de Voragine, 2

3:125–34. It could symbolize Christ the Lamb of God (Rev. 21.2–3, 9–11), whom Redcrosse resembles at his and Una’s betrothal (xii.36–4). 4 lore: doctrines and edifying literature. 5 The Dwarfe perhaps symbolizes reason, prudence, or common sense; cf. the Palmer in Book Two.

8

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Did poure into his Lemans1 lap so fast, That everie wight2 to shrowd it did constrain, And this faire couple eke to shroud themselves were fain.3 7

Enforst to seeke some covert nigh at hand, A shadie grove not farr away they spide, That promist ayde the tempest to withstand: Whose loftie trees yclad4 with sommers pride, Did spred so broad, that heavens light did hide, Not perceable with power of any starr: And all within were pathes and alleies wide, With footing worne, and leading inward farr: Fair harbour that them seemes,5 so in they entred ar.

8

And foorth they passe, with pleasure forward led, Joying to heare the birdes sweete harmony, Which therein shrouded from the tempest dred, Seemd in their song to scorne the cruell sky. Much can they praise the trees so straight and hy,6 The sayling Pine, the Cedar proud and tall, The vine-propp Elme, the Poplar never dry, The builder Oake, sole king of forrests all, The Aspine good for staves, the Cypress funerall.

9

The Laurell, meed7 of mightie Conquerours And Poets sage, the Firre that weepeth still, The Willow worne of forlorne Paramours, The Eugh obedient to the benders will The Birch for shaftes, the Sallow for the mill, The Mirrhe sweete bleeding in the bitter wound, The warlike Beech, the Ash for nothing ill, The fruitfull Olive, and the Platane round, The carver Holme, the Maple seeldom inward sound.

1

Lemans: mistress’s. wight: human being. 3 eke: also; fain: eager, happy to do something. 4 ycladd: clad. 5 them seemes: it seems to them; the verb here is impersonal and takes the dative. Forms of the word “seems” occur frequently in the first part of Book One. 2

6

The catalogue of trees is traditional, conveying a sense of plenitude. See ACH for preceding catalogues of trees and the reason for each of Spenser’s epithets; all annotators cite Chaucer’s Parliament of Fowles, 176–82. 7 meed: reward, in the form of the laurel crown.

Canto One

10

Led with delight, they thus beguile the way, Untill the blustring storme is overblowne; When weening to returne,1 whence they did stray, They cannot finde that path, which first was showne, But wander too and fro in waies unknowne, Furthest from end then, when they neerest weene, That makes them doubt, their wits be not their owne: So many pathes, so many turnings seene, That which of them to take, in diverse doubt they been.2

11

At last resolving forward still to fare, Till that some end they finde or in or out, That path they take, that beaten seemd most bare, And like to lead the labyrinth about; Which when by tract3 they hunted had throughout, At length it brought them to a hollowe cave, Amid the thickest woods. The Champion stout Eftsoones4 dismounted from his courser brave, And to the Dwarfe a while his needlesse spere he gave.

12

“Be well aware,” quoth then that Ladie milde, “Least suddaine mischiefe ye too rash provoke: The danger hid, the place unknowne and wilde, Breedes dreadfull doubts: Oft fire is without smoke, And perill without show: therefore your hardy stroke Sir knight with-hold, till further tryall made.” “Ah Ladie” (sayd he) “shame were to revoke, The forward footing for an hidden shade:5 Vertue gives her selfe light, through darkenesse for to wade.”6

13

“Yea but” (quoth she) “the perill of this place I better wot7 then you, though nowe too late, To wish you backe returne with foule disgrace,

1

weening to return: supposing they can return. 2 Some commentators relate this wood to the selva oscura, or “dark wood,” in which Dante’s Pilgrim finds himself lost in the beginning of The Divine Comedy. 3 tract: traces. 4 Eftsoones: immediately.

9

5 I.e., it would be shameful to turn back because of obscuring shadows. 6 Cf. 14.4–5 and x.1, which passages undercut this heroic-sounding speech, showing it to be a revelation of Redcrosse’s spiritual overconfidence. 7 wot: know.

10

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Yet wisedome warnes, whilest foot is in the gate, To stay the steppe, ere forced to retrate. This is the wandring wood, this Errours den, A monster vile, whom God and man does hate: Therefore I read1 beware.” “Fly fly” (quoth then The fearefull Dwarfe:) “this is no place for living men.” 14

But full of fire and greedy hardiment, The youthfull knight could not for ought be staide, But forth unto the darksom hole he went, And looked in: his glistring armor made A litle glooming light, much like a shade, By which he saw the ugly monster plaine, Halfe like a serpent horribly displaide, But th’other halfe did womans shape retaine, Most lothsom, filthie, foule, and full of vile disdaine.

15

And as she lay upon the durtie ground, Her huge long taile her den all overspred, Yet was in knots and many boughtes2 upwound, Pointed with mortall sting. Of her there bred, A thousand yong ones, which she dayly fed, Sucking upon her poisnous dugs, eachone Of sundrie shapes, yet all ill favored: Soone as that uncouth light upon them shone, Into her mouth they crept, and suddain all were gone.

16

Their dam upstart, out of her den effraide, And rushed forth, hurling her hideous taile About her cursed head, whose folds displaid Were stretcht now forth at length without entraile.3 She lookt about, and seeing one in mayle Armed to point,4 sought backe to turne againe; For light she hated as the deadly bale,5 Ay wont6 in desert darknes to remaine, Where plain none might her see, nor she see any plaine.

1

4

2

5

read: counsel. boughtes: coils. 3 without entraile: without coiling.

Armed to point: fully armed. bale: death or grave damage. 6 wont: accustomed.

Canto One

17

Which when the valiant Elfe1 perceiv’d, he lept As Lyon fierce upon the flying pray, And with his trenchand2 blade her boldly kept From turning backe, and forced her to stay: Therewith enrag’d, she loudly gan to bray, And turning fierce, her speckled taile advaunst, Threatning her angrie sting, him to dismay: Who nought aghast, his mightie hand enhaunst:3 The stroke down from her head unto her shoulder glaunst.

18

Much daunted with that dint, her sence was dazd, Yet kindling rage her selfe she gathered round, And all attonce her beastly bodie raizd With doubled forces high above the ground: Tho4 wrapping up her wrethed sterne arownd, Lept fierce upon his shield, and her huge traine5 All suddenly about his body wound, That hand or foot to stirr he strove in vaine: God helpe the man so wrapt in Errours endlesse traine.

19

His Lady sad to see his sore constraint, Cride out, “Now now Sir knight, shew what ye bee Add faith unto your force,6 and be not faint: Strangle her, els she sure will strangle thee.” That when he heard, in great perplexitie, His gall did grate for griefe and high disdaine, And knitting all his force7 got one hand free, Wherewith he grypt her gorge with so great paine, That soone to loose her wicked bands did her constraine.

20

Therewith she spewd out of her filthie maw A floud of poyson horrible and blacke, Full of great lumps of flesh and gobbets raw, Which stunck so vildly, that it forst him slacke, His grasping hold, and from her turne him backe:

1

Elfe: literally a male fairy, but apparently here used generally for any inhabitant of Faerie Land; cf. x.60.1–2; x.64–5. 2 trenchand: sharp. 3 enhaunst: raised.

4

Tho: Then. traine: tail. 6 Cf. 2 Pet. 1.5. 7 Cf. i.24.6. 5

11

12

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Her vomit full of bookes and papers was,1 With loathly frogs2 and toades, which eyes did lacke, And creeping sought way in the weedy gras: Her filthie parbreake3 all the place defiled has. 21

As when old father Nilus 4 gins to swell With timely pride above the Aegyptian vale, His fattie waves doe fertile slime outwell, And overflow each plaine and lowly dale: But when his later ebbe gins t’avale,5 Huge heapes of mudd he leaves, wherein there breed Ten thousand kindes of creatures partly male And partly femall of his fruitful seed; Such ugly monstrous shapes elswher may no man reed.6

22

The same so sore annoyed has the knight, That welnigh choked with the deadly stinke, His forces faile, ne can no longer fight. Whose corage when the feend perceivd to shrinke, She poured forth out of her hellish sinke Her fruitfull cursed spawne of serpents small, Deformed monsters, fowle, and blacke as inke, Which swarming all about his legs did crall, And him encombred sore, but could not hurt at all.

23

As gentle Shepheard in sweete eventide, When ruddy Phebus gins to welke7 in west, High on an hill, his flocke to vewen wide, Markes which doe byte their hasty supper best, A cloud of cumbrous gnattes doe him molest, All striving to infixe their feeble stinges,

1

Symbolizing, among other things, theological writings, in which error is difficult to avoid. 2 Cf. Rev. 16.13. 3 parbreake: vomit. 4 The river Nile. “Spenser often uses the Latin forms of proper names as here”

(TPR). Spenser employs this same comparison in III.vi.8–9. 5 gins t’avale: begins to abate. 6 reed: see. This usage occurs only in Spenser, and frequently there. See also III.ix.2.3; V.xii.39 (OED, “read,” 4). 7 welke: fade, sink. An epic simile in the manner of Homer.

Canto One

13

That from their noyance he no where can rest, But with his clownish1 hands their tender wings, He brusheth oft, and oft doth mar their murmurings.2 24

Thus ill bestedd,3 and fearefull more of shame, Then of the certeine perill he stood in, Halfe furious unto his foe he came, Resolvd in minde all suddenly to win, Or soone to lose, before he once would lin;4 And stroke at her with more then manly force,5 That from her body full of filthie sin He raft her hatefull heade without remorse; A streame of cole black blood forth gushed from her corse.

25

Her scattred brood, soone as their Parent deare They saw so rudely falling to the ground, Groning full deadly, all with troublous feare, Gathred themselves about her body round, Weening their wonted6 entrance to have found At her wide mouth: but being there withstood They flocked all about her bleeding wound, And sucked up their dying mothers bloud, Making her death their life, and eke her hurt their good.

26

That detestable sight him much amazde, To see th’unkindly Impes7 of heaven accurst, Devoure their dam; on whom while so he gazd, Having all satisfide their bloudy thurst, Their bellies swolne he saw with fulnesse burst, And bowels gushing forth: well worthy end Of such as drunke her life, the which them nurst; Now needeth him no lenger labour spend, His foes have slaine themselves, with whom he should contend.

1

clownish: rustic. Onomatopoeia. 3 bestedd: situated. 4 lin: leave off. 2

5

more then manly force: more than what a man could do—evidently the effect of adding faith unto his force, recommended in 19.3. Cf. vii.6.4; ix.48.7. 6 wonted: accustomed. 7 unkindly Impes: unnatural children.

14

The Faerie Queene: Book One

27

His Lady seeing all, that chaunst, from farre Approcht in hast to greet his victorie, And saide, “Faire knight, borne under happie starre, Who see your vanquisht foes before you lye: Well worthie be you of that Armory,1 Wherein ye have great glory wonne this day, And proov’d your strength on a strong enimie, Your first adventure: many such I pray, And henceforth ever wish, that like succeed it may.”

28

Then mounted he upon his Steede againe, And with the Lady backward sought to wend; That path he kept, which beaten was most plaine, Ne ever would to any byway bend, But still did follow one unto the end, The which at last out of the wood them brought. So forward on his way (with God to frend)2 He passed forth, and new adventure sought, Long way he traveiled, before he heard of ought.

29

At length they chaunst to meet upon the way An aged Sire, in long blacke weedes3 yclad, His feete all bare, his beard all hoarie gray, And by his belt his booke he hanging had; Sober he seemde, and very sagely sad, And to the ground his eyes were lowly bent, Simple in shew, and voide of malice bad, And all the way he prayed as he went, And often knockt his brest, as one that did repent.

30

He faire the knight saluted, louting low,4 Who faire him quited,5 as that courteous was: And after asked him, if he did know Of straunge adventures, which abroad did pas. “Ah my deare Sonne” (quoth he) “how should, alas,

1

Armory: armor. to frend: as friend. Whatever his missteps, he is now in a good relationship with God. 3 weedes: garments. The long black garment, the book hanging by the belt, and 2

knocking the breast are Roman Catholic attributes. Cf. OF, 2.12–3, in which Angelica meets the hypocritical old hermit. 4 louting low: bowing low. 5 faire him quited: returned the salutation politely.

Canto One

15

Silly1 old man, that lives in hidden cell, Bidding his beades all day for his trespas,2 Tydings of warre and worldly trouble tell? With holy father sits not with such thinges to mell.3 31

But if of daunger which hereby doth dwell, And homebredd evil ye desire to heare, Of a straunge man I can you tidings tell, That wasteth all this countrie farre and neare.” “Of such” (saide he) “I chiefly doe inquere, And shall thee well rewarde to shew the place, In which that wicked wight4 his dayes doth weare: For to all knighthood it is foule disgrace, That such a cursed creature lives so long a space.”

32

“Far hence” (quoth he) “in wastfull5 wildernesse His dwelling is, by which no living wight6 May ever passe, but thorough great distresse.”7 “Now” (saide the Ladie) “draweth toward night, And well I wote, that of your later8 fight Ye all forwearied9 be: for what so strong, But wanting rest will also want of might? The Sunne that measures heaven all day long, At night doth baite10 his steedes the Ocean waves emong.

33

“Then with the Sunne take Sir, your timely rest, And with new day new worke at once begin: Untroubled night they say gives counsell best.” “Right well Sir knight ye have advised bin,”

1

5

2

6

silly: innocent. If “beades” bears its modern meaning, as it seems to do in iii.13.6–9, then praying with the aid of beads is saying the rosary, which is a Romanist activity. Contrast with Caelia, in x.3.8, who bids her beads only at night, whereas she is occupied with good deeds during the day. 3 mell: meddle. I.e., it is not fitting for a holy father to concern himself with such things. 4 wight: person.

wastfull: desolate. wight: person. 7 Since we never again hear of this villain (except in a patent lie by Archimago in iii.29.1–6), Archimago must have just made him up to engage Redcrosse’s interest. 8 wote: know; later: recent. Spenser often appends “-er” to an adjective just to gain a needed short syllable. 9 forwearied: very wearied. 10 baite: give rest and food to.

16

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Quoth then that aged man; “the way to win Is wisely to advise: now day is spent; Therefore with me ye may take up your In1 For this same night.” The knight was well content: So with that godly father to his home they went. 34

A litle lowly Hermitage it was, Downe in a dale, hard by a forests side, Far from resort of people, that did pas In traveill to and froe: a litle wyde2 There was an holy chappell edifyde,3 Wherein the Hermite dewly wont4 to say His holy thinges5 each morne and eventyde: Thereby a christall streame did gently play, Which from a sacred fountaine welled forth alway.

35

Arrived there the litle house they fill, Ne looke for entertainement, where none was: Rest is their feast, and all thinges at their will;6 The noblest mind the best contentment has. With faire discourse the evening so they pas: For that olde man of pleasing wordes had store, And well could file his tongue as smooth as glas,7 He told of Saintes and Popes, and evermore He strowd8 an Ave-Mary after and before.

36

The drouping Night thus creepeth on them fast, And the sad humor9 loading their eye liddes, As messenger of Morpheus10 on them cast Sweet slombring deaw, the which to sleep them biddes: Unto their lodgings then his guestes he riddes:11

1 take up your In: take up residence as at an inn. 2 wyde: off to one side. 3 edifyde: built. 4 wont: was accustomed. 5 holy thinges: the monastic offices for morning and evening. 6 I.e., rest is entertainment to them; and because they desire nothing, they have “all things at their will” (TPR).

7

He was a “smooth talker.” strowd: interspersed. The “Hail Mary” is “the principal prayer of the rosary” (TPR), moreover, he apparently says it in Latin; Protestants associated this prayer with Catholic Mariolatry. 9 humor: moisture. 10 God of sleep. 11 riddes: dispatches. 8

Canto One

17

Where when all drownd in deadly sleepe he findes, He to his studie goes, and there amiddes His magick bookes and artes of sundrie kindes, He seekes out mighty charmes, to trouble sleepy minds. 37

Then choosing out few words most horrible, (Let none them read) thereof did verses frame, With which and other spelles like terrible, He bad awake blacke Plutoes griesly Dame,1 And cursed heven, and spake reprochful shame Of highest God, the Lord of life and light, A bold bad man, that dar’d to call by name Great Gorgon,2 prince of darknes and dead night, At which Cocytus quakes and Styx is put to flight.

38

And forth he cald out of deepe darknes dredd Legions of Sprights,3 the which like litle flyes Fluttring about his everdamned hedd, A waite whereto their service he applyes, To aide his friendes, or fray4 his enemies: Of those he chose out two, the falsest twoo, And fittest for to forge true-seeming lyes; The one of them he gave a message too, The other by him self staide other worke to doo.

39

He making speedy way through spersed ayre,5 And through the world of waters wide and deepe, To Morpheus6 house doth hastily repaire. Amid the bowels of the earth full steepe, And low, where dawning day doth never peepe, His dwelling is; there Tethys7 his wet bed

1

Pluto’s wife, Proserpina, queen of hell. Demogorgon, the progenitor of all the gods. Mentioned again at v.22.5ff. Like “Cocytus,” chosen largely for its sound. “Even mention of his name makes the rivers of hell (Cocytus and Styx) tremble” (TPR). 3 Sprights: spirits. 2

4

fray: frighten. He: the sprite with the message; spersed ayre: the air that parted to let him through. 6 See Metamorphoses, 11:592–632; Chaucer, The Book of the Duchess, 155ff, which also contains a farcical awakening. 7 Wife of Ocean, hence goddess of the sea; here the sea itself. 5

18

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Doth ever wash,1 and Cynthia still doth steepe In silver deaw his ever-drouping hed,2 Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth spred. 40

Whose double gates he findeth locked fast, The one faire fram’d of burnisht Yvory, The other all with silver overcast;3 And wakeful dogges before them farre doe lye, Watching to banish Care their enimy, Who oft is wont to trouble gentle Sleepe. By them the Sprite doth passe in quietly, And unto Morpheus comes, whom drowned deepe In drowsie fit he findes: of nothing he takes keepe.4

41

And more, to lulle him in his slumber soft, A trickling streame from high rock tumbling downe And ever drizling raine upon the loft,5 Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the sowne6 Of swarming Bees, did cast him in a swowne: No other noyse, nor peoples troublous cryes, As still are wont t’annoy the walled towne, Might there be heard: but carelesse Quiet lyes, Wrapt in eternall silence farre from enimyes.7

42

The Messenger approching to him spake, But his waste wordes retournd to him in vaine: So sound he slept, that nought mought him awake. Then rudely he him thrust, and pusht with paine, Whereat he gan to stretch: but he againe Shooke him so hard, that forced him to speake.

1

wash: as waves wash a gently sloping shore. Why a wet bed is soporific remains unexplained; it would make more sense if the “bed” were the Ocean’s bed; one would have to conjecture either that Spenser said “his” when he meant “her,” or that he forgot that Tethys is female. 2 Cynthia is the moon. Dew materializes at night, when the moon is visible; astrology associates her with moisture. 3 The Gates of Sleep are from Homer, Odyssey, 19.562–67, and Aeneid, 6.893–96. They are pictured as side-by-side alterna-

tives; the gate of horn channels true dreams and is not mentioned, being replaced by a gate of silver; the gate of ivory channels false dreams, and the sprite exits through it at 44.6. 4 fit: mood; keepe: notice. 5 loft: ceiling (OED, 5c). 6 sowne: sound. 7 Spenser flaunts his skill at creating a mood by means of rhetoric and versification. Here and elsewhere, he slips easily into personification.

Canto One

19

As one then in a dreame, whose dryer braine1 Is tost with troubled sights and fancies weake, He mumbled soft, but would not all his silence breake. 43

The Sprite2 then gan more boldly him to wake, And threatned unto him the dreaded name Of Hecate:3 whereat he gan to quake, And lifting up his lompish head, with blame Halfe angrie asked him, for what he came. “Hether” (quoth he) “me Archimago4 sent, He that the stubborne Sprites can wisely tame, He bids thee to him send for his intent A fit false dreame, that can delude the sleepers sent.”5

44

The God obayde, and calling forth straight way A diverse dreame out of his prison darke, Delivered it to him, and downe did lay His heavie head, devoide of careful carke,6 Whose sences all were straight benumbd and starke. He backe returning by the Yvorie dore, Remounted up as light as chearefull Larke, And on his litle winges the dreame he bore, In hast unto his Lord, where he him left afore.

45

Who all this while with charmes and hidden artes, Had made a Lady of that other Spright, And fram’d of liquid ayre her tender partes So lively and so like in all mens sight, That weaker sence it could have ravisht quight: The maker selfe for all his wondrous witt,

1

dryer braine: too-dry brain. See SE, “dreams.” 2 Sprite: spirit. 3 The queen of Hades, another name for Proserpina; in Natalis Comes (Natale Conti, Spenser’s and the Elizabethans’ favorite mythographer, for whose comments on each god mentioned by Spenser, translated into English, see Lotspeich) the patroness of black magic and goddess of dreams. 4 Here Archimago is named for the first time. He is both “master of images” and

“master-magician.” Protestants charged that Catholic ritual was supposed to operate like magic, without considering the spiritual state of the performer. He symbolizes the devil as tempter and owes something to the False Prophet in Rev., as well as to “the disguised hermit in Ariosto’s OF 2.12–3 and the enchanter Malagigi in Tasso’s Rinaldo I.31” (M&P). 5 sent: senses. 6 careful carke: worry.

20

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Was nigh beguiled with so goodly sight: Her all in white he clad, and over it Cast a black stole, most like to seeme for Una fit.1 46

Now when that ydle2 dreame was to him brought, Unto that Elfin knight he bad him fly, Where he slept soundly void of evil thought, And with false shewes abuse his fantasy, In sort as he him schooled privily: And that new creature borne without her dew,3 Full of the makers guyle with usage sly He taught to imitate that Lady trew, Whose semblance she did carrie under feigned hew.4

47

Thus well instructed, to their worke they haste, And comming where the knight in slomber lay, The one upon his hardie head him plaste, And made him dreame of loves and lustfull play, That nigh his manly hart did melt away, Bathed in wanton blis and wicked joy: Then seemed him5 his Lady by him lay, And to him playnd, how that false winged boy,6 Her chaste hart had subdewd, to learn Dame pleasures toy.7

48

And she her selfe of beautie soveraigne Queene, Fayre Venus seemde unto his bed to bring Her, whom he waking evermore did weene, To bee the chastest flowre, that aye did spring On earthly braunch, the daughter of a king, Now a loose Leman8 to vile service bound: And eke the Graces seemed all to sing, Hymen iõ Hymen,9 dauncing all around, Whylst freshest Flora10 her with Yvie girlond crownd.

1

Una means “one,” i.e., consistent, in Latin. In this she contrasts with Duessa, the first syllable of whose name means “two,” i.e., duplicitous. See SE, “Una.” “Una is not named until the duplicate, false image has been created” (TPR); Spenser customarily defers naming his characters. 2 ydle: baseless. 3 without her dew: unnaturally. 4 hew: physical appearance.

5

seemed him: it seemed to him. playnd: complained; false winged boy: Cupid. So also “blind God” below. 7 Dame pleasures toy: lovemaking. 8 Leman: mistress. 9 Hymen iõ Hymen: a chant at Roman weddings; here ironical. 10 Goddess of spring and flowers, but also the name of a famous harlot in classical 6

Canto One

49

In this great passion of unwonted1 lust, Or wonted feare of doing ought amis, He starteth up, as seeming to mistrust, Some secret ill, or hidden foe of his: Lo there before his face his Ladie is, Under blacke stole hyding her bayted hooke, And as halfe blushing offred him to kis, With gentle blandishment and lovely looke, Most like that virgin true, which for her knight him took.

50

All cleane dismayd to see so uncouth sight, And halfe enraged at her shamelesse guise,2 He thought have slaine her in his fierce despight,3 But hastie heat tempring with sufferance wise, He stayde his hand, and gan himselfe advise To prove his sense, and tempt her faigned truth. Wringing her hands in wemens piteous wise, Tho can she weepe, to stirre up gentle ruth,4 Both for her noble blood, and for her tender youth.

51

And sayd, “Ah Sir, my liege Lord and my love, Shall I accuse the hidden cruell fate, And mightie causes wrought in heaven above, Or the blind God, that doth me thus amate,5 For hoped love to winne me certaine hate? Yet thus perforce he bids me do, or die. Die is my dew: yet rew my wretched state You, whom my hard avenging destinie Hath made judge of my life or death indifferently.

52

“Your owne dear sake forst me at first to leave My Fathers kingdom,” There she stopt with teares; Her swollen hart her speech seemd to bereave, And then againe begonne, “My weaker yeares Captiv’d to fortune and frayle worldly feares Fly to your fayth for succour and sure ayde:

Rome; here used disparagingly, as classical gods usually are in Book One; cf. II.ii.6.5. 1 unwonted: unaccustomed. 2 guise: behavior. 3 despight: wrath. 4 Tho can: then did; ruth: pity.

21

5 amate: dismay; here by forcing her to offer herself to Redcrosse and perhaps thus disgust him, as she indeed does, though he cleverly pretends not to understand what she is suggesting.

22

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Let me not die in languor and long teares.” “Why Dame” (quoth he) “what hath ye thus dismayd? What frayes1 ye, that were wont to comfort me affrayd?” 53

“Love of your selfe,” she saide, “and deare2 constraint Lets me not sleepe, but waste the wearie night In secret anguish and unpittied plaint, Whiles you in carelesse sleepe are drowned quight.” Her doubtfull words made that redoubted knight Suspect her truth: yet since no’untruth he knew, Her fawning love with foule disdainefull spight He would not shend,3 but said, “Dear dame I rew, That for my sake unknowne such griefe unto you grew.

54

“Assure your selfe, it fell not all to ground; For all so deare as life is to my hart, I deeme your love, and hold me4 to you bound; Ne let vaine feares procure your needlesse smart, Where cause is none, but to your rest depart.” Not all content, yet seemd she to appease Her mournefull plaintes, beguiled of her art,5 And fed with words, that could not chose but please, So sliding softly forth, she turnd as to her ease.

55

Long after lay he musing at her mood, Much griev’d to thinke that gentle Dame so light,6 For whose defence he was to shed his blood. At last dull wearines of former fight Having yrockt a sleepe his irkesome spright, That troublous dreame gan freshly tosse his braine, With bowres, and beds, and ladies deare delight: But when he7 saw his labour all was vaine, With that misformed spright he backe returnd againe.

1

6

2

7

frayes: frightens. deare: here, dire, an unusual use; for the normal use, see line 8 of this stanza. 3 shend: rebuke. 4 hold me: consider myself. 5 plaintes: complaints; beguiled of her art: being disappointed that her women’s wiles did not succeed in seducing him.

light: wanton, forth-putting. I.e., the sprite who was administering the dream, as in stanza 47. The “misformed sprite” is the one who is impersonating Una (ii.2). Their failure shows that Redcrosse has so far resisted temptation and remained sinless, though his priggish desire to slay the false Una is worrisome.

Canto Two The guilefull great Enchaunter1 parts The Redcrosse Knight from Truth: Into whose stead faire falshood steps, And workes him woefull ruth.2

1

By this the Northerne wagoner had set His sevenfold teme behind the stedfast starre, That was in Ocean waves yet never wet, But firme is fixt, and sendeth light from farre To al, that in the wide deepe wandring arre:3 And chearefull Chaunticlere4 with his note shrill Had warned once, that Phoebus fiery carre,5 In hast was climbing up the Easterne hill, Full envious that night so long his roome did fill.

2

When those accursed messengers of hell, That feigning dreame, and that faire-forged Spright Came to their wicked maister, and gan tel Their bootelesse paines, and ill succeeding night: Who all in rage to see his skilfull might Deluded so, gan threaten hellish paine And sad Proserpines 6 wrath, them to affright. But when he saw his threatning was but vaine, He cast about, and searcht his baleful bokes againe.

1 great Enchaunter: one indubitable etymology of “Archimago.” 2 ruth: damage. 3 These five lines constitute a conspicuously abstruse astronomical way of telling time. The “Northerne wagoner” is the constellation Boötes, the ox-driver. His “sevenfold teme” are the seven bright stars of Ursa Major, identified with the Plough or Charles’ Wain in England and the Big Dipper in the U.S.; the “stedfast starre” is the

Pole Star or North Star, which was thought never to move, and so never to set into the ocean (TPR). 4 Chaunticlere: the rooster. 5 Phoebus fiery carre: the chariot of the sun, pictured as climbing up the bulging surface of his underground orbit toward the eastern horizon. 6 Proserpina is the wife of Pluto and therefore the queen of Hell.

23

24

The Faerie Queene: Book One

3

Eftsoones he tooke that miscreated faire,1 And that false other Spright,2 on whom he spred A seeming body of the subtile aire, Like a young Squire, in loves and lusty hed His wanton daies that ever loosely led,3 Without regard of armes and dreaded fight: Those twoo he tooke, and in a secrete bed, Covered with darkenes and misdeeming night, Them both together laid, to joy in vaine delight.

4

Forthwith he runnes with feigned faithfull hast Unto his guest, who after troublous sights And dreames gan now to take more sound repast,4 Whom suddenly he wakes with fearful frights, As one aghast with feends or damned sprights, And to him cals, “Rise rise unhappy Swaine, That here wex5 old in sleepe, whiles wicked wights Have knit themselves in Venus shameful chaine;6 Come see, where your false Lady doth her honor staine.”

5

All in amaze he suddenly up start With sword in hand, and with the old man went; Who soone him brought into a secret part, Where that false couple were full closely ment7 In wanton lust and leud enbracement: Which when he saw, he burnt with gealous fire, The eie of reason was with rage yblent,8 And would have slaine them in his furious ire, But hardly9 was restreined of that aged sire.

1

Eftsoones: immediately; that miscreated faire: that unnaturally created beauty. 2 I.e., the one who formerly manipulated the sexual dream. 3 I.e., that ever loosely led his wanton days. Word order is inverted for sake of rhyme. 4 repast: repose. 5 wex: wax, i.e., become. 6 I.e., linked themselves in intercourse.

7

closely ment: tightly or secretly united. I.e., the passion of rage blinded the eye of reason. See also ii.12.4: “Will was his guide, and grief led him astray.” These diagnoses are in terms of the faculty-psychology common in older literature. Reason is not doing its job—to control the will and, through it, the passions such as rage and grief. 9 hardly: with difficulty. 8

Canto Two

6

Retourning to his bed in torment great, And bitter anguish of his guilty sight, He could not rest, but did his stout heart eat, And wast his inward gall with deepe despight,1 Yrkesome of life,2 and too long lingring night. At last faire Hesperus3 in highest skie Had spent his lampe, and brought forth dawning light, Then up he rose, and clad him hastily; The dwarfe him brought his steed: so both away do fly.

7

Now when the rosy fingred Morning faire, Weary of aged Tithones4 saffron bed, Had spred her purple robe through deawy aire, And the high hils Titan discovered,5 The royall virgin shooke of drousy hed, And rising forth out of her baser bowre, Lookt for her knight, who far away was fled, And for her dwarfe, that wont to wait each howre; Then gan she wail and weepe, to see that woeful stowre.6

8

And after him she rode with so much speede, As her slowe beast could make; but all in vaine: For him so far had borne7 his light-foot steede, Pricked with wrath and fiery fierce disdaine, That him to follow was but fruitlesse paine; Yet she her weary limbes would never rest, But every hil and dale, each wood and plaine Did search, sore grieved in her gentle brest, He so ungently left her, whome she loved best.

9

But subtill Archimago when his guests He saw divided into double parts, And Una wandring in woods and forrests, Th’end of his drift,8 he praisd his divelish arts,

1

despight: wrath. Yrksome of life: finding life irksome. 3 Venus positioned as the morning star. 4 Aurora, goddess of the dawn, loved Tithonus and persuaded the gods to grant him immortality; but she forgot to obtain 2

25

for him eternal youth, so that he lived but just went on getting older. 5 Titan: the sun; discovered: uncovered them for mortal watchers. 6 stowre: time of distress. 7 borne: carried off. 8 Th’end of his drift: the goal of his plan.

26

The Faerie Queene: Book One

That had such might over true meaning harts: Yet rests not so, but other meanes doth make, How he may worke unto her further smarts: For her he hated as the hissing snake, And in her many troubles did most pleasure take. 10

He then devisde himselfe how to disguise; For by his mighty science he could take As many formes and shapes in seeming wise, As ever Proteus1 to himselfe could make: Sometime a fowle, sometime a fish in lake, Now like a foxe, now like a dragon fell,2 That of himselfe he ofte for feare would quake, And oft would flie away. O who can tell The hidden powre of herbes, and might of Magick spel?

11

But now seemde best, the person to put on Of that good knight, his late beguiled guest: In mighty armes he was yclad anon: And silver shield, upon his coward brest A bloody crosse, and on his craven crest A bounch of heares discolourd diversly:3 Full jolly knight he seemde, and wel addrest,4 And when he sate uppon his courser free, Saint George5 himselfe ye would have deemed him to be.

12

But he the knight, whose semblaunt he did beare, The true Saint George was wandred far away, Still flying from his thoughts and gealous feare; Will was his guide, and griefe led him astray. At last him chaunst to meete upon the way A faithlesse Sarazin6 all armde to point,

1

A god of the sea, also a shapeshifter. He will appear in person in Book Four. 2 fell: ruthless. 3 heares discolourd diversly: hairs of various colors; i.e., a plume. Arthur’s plume is similar (vii.32). 4 addrest: readied. 5 Redcrosse is here named for the first time. He has been called St. George in ii.11.9,

but in x.61 we learn he earns this name only when he kills the dragon, and he may not even know his name is George; hence critics, and indeed, most of the time, the poet-speaker, call him Redcrosse. This description echoes the description of Redcrosse in i.1. 6 Sarazin: Saracen, a pagan or infidel— epithets ignorantly applied to Muslims such as the feared and hated Turks.

Canto Two

27

In whose great shield was writ with letters gay Sans foy:1 full large of limbe and every joint He was, and cared not for God or man a point. 13

Hee had a faire companion of his way, A goodly Lady2 clad in scarlot red, Purfled3 with gold and pearle of rich assay, And like a Persian mitre4 on her hed Shee wore, with crowns and owches5 garnished, The which her lavish lovers to her gave; Her wanton palfrey all was overspred With tinsell trappings, woven like a wave, Whose bridle rung with golden bels and bosses6 brave.

14

With faire disport7 and courting dalliaunce She intertainde her lover all the way: But when she saw the knight his speare advaunce, Shee soone left off her mirth and wanton play, And bad her knight addresse him to the fray: His foe was nigh at hand. He prickte with pride8 And hope to winne his Ladies hearte that day, Forth spurred fast: adowne his coursers side The red bloud trickling staind the way, as he did ride.

1

Means “without faith” in French. His brothers are Sansloy (without law) and Sansjoy (without joy). The Sans brothers are the villains threatening Redcrosse and Una in the middle cantos. The faith Sansfoy lacks is not only religious but also, on the allegorical level, sexual, in that he reflects Redcrosse, who has recently broken his “faith” to Una by deserting her; whereas Redcrosse will praise Una for her “wondrous faith” to him. 2 Duessa here appears for the first time. She will appear in every book up through Book Five, in which she is finally executed. In Book One, she represents the Scarlet Whore of Babylon (Rev. 17–18.3), whom Protestant commentators on Rev. took to

be a prophecy of the corrupt state of the Catholic Church in the last days of the world. She appears with all her apocalyptic attributes in vii.16ff. 3 Purfled: embroidered. 4 mitre: a bishop’s hat. Persia is associated with opulence, decadence, and tyranny, and so was the Roman Church. 5 owches: brooches. 6 bosses: ornamental knobs, here, on the ends of the bridle bit. 7 disport: wanton gestures. 8 prickte with pride: spurred by pride as he spurs his horse, but also with sexual overtones.

28

The Faerie Queene: Book One

15

The knight of the Redcrosse1 when him he spide, Spurring so hote with rage dispiteous, Gan fairely couch his speare,2 and towards ride: Soone meete they both, both fell3 and furious, That daunted with theyr forces hideous, Their steeds doe stagger and amazed stand, And eke themselves too rudely rigorous, Astonied4 with the stroke of their owne hand, Doe backe rebutte,5 and ech to other yealdeth land.

16

As when two rams stird with ambitious pride, Fight for the rule of the rich fleeced flocke, Their horned fronts so fierce on either side, Doe meete, that with the terror of the shocke Astonied both, stand sencelesse as a blocke, Forgetfull of the hanging victory: So stood these twaine, unmoved as a rocke, Both staring fierce, and holding idely, The broken reliques of their former cruelty.6

17

The Sarazin7 sore daunted with the buffe Snatcheth his sword, and fiercely to him flies; Who well it wards, and quyteth cuff with cuff:8 Each others equall puissaunce envies, And through their iron sides with cruell spies9 Does seeke to perce: repining10 courage yields No foote to foe. The flashing fier flies As from a forge out of their burning shields, And streams of purple bloud new dies the verdant fields.

1

This is the first time he is called Redcrosse. couch his speare: bring it down from its normally vertical traveling position to the horizontal fighting position, and lay it in its rest. 3 fell: ruthless. 4 Astonied: stunned. 5 rebutte: recoil. 6 I.e., their now-broken spears. The spear was the first weapon of the first phase, the horseback, of knightly combat. 2

7

Sarazin: Saracen, Muslim. quyteth cuff with cuff: returns blow for blow. 9 cruell spies: corrected from F.E. in defiance of 1590 and 1596 editions, which had the tautological word “cruelties.” In a bold metaphor, the corrector (who, if not Spenser, must have had at least some input from him) probably envisioned each combatant discovering and aiming for the chinks in his opponent’s armor. 10 repining: weakening, fading. 8

Canto Two

18

“Curse on that Crosse” (quoth then the Sarazin) “That keepes thy body from the bitter fitt;1 Dead long ygoe I wote thou haddest bin, Had not that charme from thee forwarned itt:2 But yet I warne thee now assured sitt,3 And hide thy head.” Therewith upon his crest With rigor so outrageous he smitt, That a large share it hewd out of the rest, And glauncing downe his shield, from blame him fairely blest.4

19

Who thereat wondrous wroth, the sleeping spark Of native vertue5 gan eftsoones revive, And at his haughty helmet making mark, So hugely stroke, that it the steele did rive,6 And cleft his head. He tumbling downe alive, With bloudy mouth his mother earth did kis, Greeting his grave: his grudging ghost did strive With the fraile flesh; at last it flitted is, Whether7 the soules doe fly of men, that live amis.

20

The Lady when she saw her champion fall, Like the old ruines of a broken towre, Staid not to waile his woefull funerall, But from him fled away with all her powre; Who after her as hastily gan scowre,8 Bidding the dwarfe with him to bring away

1 bitter

fitt: death, possibly referring to the phase of trembling and stretching that occurs during a violent death. 2 Spenser contrives to make Sansfoy curse the cross to emphasize his enmity to Christianity. Sansfoy believes there is something efficacious about the cross. Because many Catholics did so, too, some commentators say Spenser could not have believed it. But there are other instances in the poem at which a material cross does seem efficacious. As we shall see in Canto Ten, Spenser retained some Catholic beliefs. See Kaske, 1999, 88–9. 3 assured sitt: hold onto your saddle.

4

29

from blame him fairely blest: from harm it preserved him; “it” (line 8) refers by squinting syntax to the shield, which does, to an extent, operate as Sansfoy complained that it does. 5 native vertue: his own natural strength (from Latin virtus); cf. the “more than manly force” by which he kills Errour in i.24.6 (ACH). 6 rive: split. 7 whether: whither, to which. 8 scowre: run, pursue.

30

The Faerie Queene: Book One

The Sarazins shield, signe of the conqueroure,1 Her soone he overtooke, and bad to stay, For present cause was none of dread her to dismay. 21

Shee turning backe with ruefull countenaunce, Cride, “Mercy mercy Sir vouchsafe to show On silly2 Dame, subject to hard mischaunce, And to your mighty wil.” Her humblesse low In so ritch weedes and seeming glorious show, Did much emmove his stout heroicke heart, And said, “Deare dame, your suddein overthrow Much rueth me;3 but now put feare apart, And tel, both who ye be, and who that tooke your part.”

22

Melting in teares, then gan shee thus lament; “The wreched woman, whom unhappy howre Hath now made thrall4 to your commandement, Before that angry heavens list to lowre,5 And fortune false betraide me to thy powre, Was, (O what now availeth that I was?) Borne the sole daughter of an Emperour,6 He that the wide West under his rule has, And high hath set his throne, where Tiberis doth pas.

23

“He in the first flowre of my freshest age, Betrothed me unto the onely haire Of a most mightly king, most rich and sage; Was never Prince so faithfull and so faire, Was never Prince so meeke and debonaire;7 But ere my hoped day of spousall shone,

1

signe of the conqueroure: sign that he had conquered Sansfoy. Taking some souvenir from a conquered enemy is a chivalric convention; it can symbolize the acquisition of some trait of the enemy. 2 silly: innocent 3 rueth me: causes me to pity you. 4 thrall: prisoner. 5 lowre: frown, scowl. 6 Duessa’s father, as Emperor of the West, stands for the Pope, the head of Western or

Roman Catholicism, as evidenced by the fact that he dwells on the banks of the Tiber. Protestants called the Pope “The Bishop of Rome.” Contrast Una and her father, who, although their seat is Eden, rule “from East to Western shore”—i.e., the entire world, thus representing the church that is truly “Catholic,” i.e., universal, including, for example, the Eastern or Greek Orthodox Church. 7 debonaire: gentle, gracious; a virtue proper for the late-medieval knight.

Canto Two

31

My dearest Lord fell from high honors staire, Into the hands of hys accursed fone, And cruelly was slaine, that shall I ever mone. 24

“His blessed body spoild of lively breath, Was afterward, I know not how, convaid And fro me hid: of whose most innocent death When tidings came to mee unhappy maid, O how great sorrow my sad soule assaid.1 Then forth I went his woefull corse to find, And many yeares throughout the world I straid, A virgin widow, whose deepe wounded mind With love, long time did languish as the striken hind.

25

“At last it chaunced this proud Sarazin, To meete me wandring, who perforce me led With him away, but yet could never win The Fort, that Ladies hold in soveraigne dread.2 There lies he now with foule dishonor dead, Who whiles he livde, was called proud Sansfoy, The eldest of three brethren, all three bred Of one bad sire, whose youngest is Sansjoy, And twixt them both was born the bloudy bold Sansloy.

26

“In this sad plight, friendlesse, unfortunate, Now miserable I Fidessa3 dwell, Craving of you in pitty of my state, To doe none ill, if please ye not doe well.” He in great passion al this while did dwell, More busying his quicke eies, her face to view,

1

assaid: tested. I.e., virginity. Cf. “For that I would not yeeld, that to Sansfoy I gave” (iv.47.9). This lie as to Fidessa’s sexual status is one of several distortions in her autobiography. There is no reason, however, to doubt her characterization of her “captor” and his family. What is revealing, whether true or false, conscious or unconscious, is her hints at her role as the Roman Church, e.g., her mitre and her fixation on the dead body of her “Lord,” paralleling the Catholic tendency 2

to place the body of Christ on their crosses, making them into crucifixes. 3 Duessa’s pseudonym replaces the first syllable of her name with “Fid-” from Latin fides, or faith—the same meaning that the syllable bears later (x.12–13, 18–21) in the name of Fidelia, or faith, who, like Duessa, wields a golden cup, magic, and a reptilian beast. The contrast hints to the reader that Fidessa means faith in the wrong object. It is ironic that she is paired with Sansfoy, or “without faith.”

32

The Faerie Queene: Book One

Then his dull eares, to heare what shee did tell, And said, “faire Lady hart of flint would rew The undeserved woes and sorrowes, which ye shew. 27

“Henceforth in safe assuraunce may ye rest, Having both found a new friend you to aid, And lost an old foe, that did you molest: Better new friend then an old foe is said.” With chaunge of chear1 the seeming simple maid Let fal her eien, as shamefast to the earth, And yeelding soft, in that she nought gain-said, So forth they rode, he feining seemely merth,2 And shee coy lookes: so dainty they say maketh derth.3

28

Long time they thus together traveiled, Til weary of their way, they came at last, Where grew two goodly trees, that faire did spred Their armes abroad, with gray mosse overcast, And their greene leaves trembling with every blast,4 Made a calme shadowe far in compasse round: The fearefull Shepheard often there aghast Under them never sat, ne wont there sound His mery oaten pipe, but shund th’unlucky ground.

29

But this good knight soone as he them can5 spie, For the coole shade him thither hastly got: For golden Phoebus now that mounted hie, From fiery wheeles of his faire chariot Hurled his beame so scorching cruell hot, That living creature mote6 it not abide; And his new Lady it endured not. There they alight, in hope themselves to hide From the fierce heat, and rest their weary limbs a tide.7

1

chear: external demeanor. feining seemely merth: forcing himself to utter appropriate pleasantries. 3 The meaning and relevance of this proverb is not clear. A.C. Hamilton suggests, “Fastidiousness makes one precious (derth: costliness) to another, implying 2

here that her coyness makes her seem more worthy to be wooed.” 4 blast: puff, breath; OED sense 2, obsolete. 5 can: did. 6 mote: might, past tense. 7 a tide: a while.

Canto Two

30

Faire seemely pleasaunce each to other makes, With goodly purposes1 there as they sit: And in his falsed2 fancy he her takes To be the fairest wight, that lived yit; Which to expresse, he bends his gentle wit, And thinkng of those braunches greene to frame A girlond3 for her dainty forehead fit, He pluckt a bough; out of whose rifte there came Smal drops of gory bloud, that trickled down the same.4

31

Therewith a piteous yelling voice was heard, Crying, “O spare with guilty hands to teare My tender sides in this rough rynd embard,5 But fly, ah fly far hence away, for feare Least to you hap, that happened to me heare, And to this wretched Lady, my deare love, O too deare love, love bought with death too deare.” Astond he stood, and up his heare did hove,6 And with that suddein horror could no member7 move.

32

At last when as the dreadfull passion Was overpast, and manhood well awake,8 Yet musing at the straunge occasion, And doubting much his sence, he thus bespake; “What voice of damned Ghost from Limbo9 lake, Or guilefull spright wandring in empty aire, Both which fraile men doe oftentimes mistake,10 Sends to my doubtful eares these speaches rare, And ruefull plaints, me bidding guiltlesse blood to spare?”

1

purposes: topics of conversation. falsed: false, deluded. 3 girlond: garland, leafy crown. 4 This begins the episode of Fradubio. The motif of a man transformed into a tree that bleeds and speaks when wounded can be found in Aeneid, 3.22–48; Dante, Inferno, 13; and OF, 6.26–53; see Kennedy. Somewhat as Fradubio predicts, Redcrosse, in abandoning Una and taking up with Duessa, is making the same mistake as Fradubio did; hence he is his “brother” (TPR). 2

5

33

embard: imprisoned. Astond: stunned, astonished; heare did hove: hair did stand on end. 7 member: part of his body. 8 manhood well awake: reason was in control of his passions (TPR). 9 The uppermost and least-threatening part of hell, but perhaps by metonymy for all of hell; for tradition does not record any particular lake in Limbo. 10 mistake: mislead; not in OED. 6

34

The Faerie Queene: Book One

33

Then groning deep, “Nor damned Ghost,” (quoth he,) “Nor guileful sprite to thee these words doth speake, But once a man Fradubio,1 now a tree, Wretched man, wretched tree; whose nature weake A cruell witch her cursed will to wreake, Hath thus transformd, and plast in open plaines, Where Boreas 2 doth blow full bitter bleake, And scorching Sunne does dry my secret vaines: For though a tree I seme, yet cold and heat me paines.”

34

“Say on Fradubio then, or3 man, or tree,” Quoth then the knight, “by whose mischievous arts Art thou misshaped thus, as now I see? He oft finds med’cine, who his griefe imparts; But double griefs afflict concealing harts, As raging flames who striveth to suppresse.”4 “The author5 then” (said he) “of all my smarts, Is one Duessa a false sorceresse, That many errant6 knights hath broght to wretchednesse.

35

“In prime of youthly yeares, when corage hott The fire of love and joy of chevalree First kindled in my brest, it was my lott To love this gentle Lady, whome ye see, Now not a Lady, but a seeming tree; With whome as once I rode accompanyde, Me chaunced of a knight encountred bee, That had a like faire Lady by his syde, Lyke a faire Lady, but did fowle Duessa hyde.

36

“Whose forged beauty he did take in hand, All other Dames to have exceded farre; I in defence of mine did likewise stand, Mine, that did then shine as the Morning starre: So both to batteill fierce arraunged arre, In which his harder fortune was to fall

1

Means “Brother Doubt.” Boreas: the north wind. 3 or: whether. 2

4

I.e., hearts that conceal grief suffer doubly, as he who strives to suppress raging flames often increases them. 5 author: originator. 6 errant: on a quest, wandering.

Canto Two

35

Under my speare: such is the dye1 of warre: His Lady left as a prise martiall,2 Did yield her comely person, to be at my call. 37

“So doubly lov’d of ladies unlike faire, Th’ one seeming such, the other such indeede, One day in doubt I cast for to compare, Whether in beauties glorie did exceede; A Rosy girlond was the victors meede:3 Both seemde to win, and both seemde won to bee, So hard the discord was to be agreede. Fralissa was as faire, as faire mote4 bee, And ever false Duessa seemde as faire as shee.

38

“The wicked witch now seeing all this while The doubtfull ballaunce equally to sway, What not by right, she cast to win by guile, And by her hellish science raisd streight way A foggy mist, that overcast the day, And a dull blast, that breathing on her5 face, Dimmed her former beauties shining ray, And with foule ugly forme did her disgrace: Then was she fayre alone, when none was faire in place.6

39

“Then cride she out, ‘fye, fye, deformed wight, Whose borrowed beautie now appeareth plaine To have before bewitched all mens sight; O leave her soone, or let her soone be slaine.’ Her loathly visage viewing with disdaine, Eftsoones I thought her such, as she me told, And would have kild her; but with faigned paine, The false witch did my wrathfull hand with-hold: So left her, where she now is turnd to treen mould.7

1

dye: singular of “dice.” Fradubio courteously attributes his victory to chance. 2 prise martiall: spoil or booty left from an armed conflict. 3 meede: reward.

4

Fralissa: “frail,” from Italian “fralezza” (ACH); mote: might, past tense. 5 I.e., Fralissa’s. 6 in place: in the present place. 7 treen mould: form of a tree.

36

The Faerie Queene: Book One

40

“Thensforth I tooke Duessa for my Dame, And in the witch unweeting1 joyd long time, Ne ever wist, but that she was the same, Till on a day (that day is everie Prime,2 When Witches wont do penance for their crime) I chaunst to see her in her proper hew,3 Bathing herselfe in origane and thyme:4 A filthy foule old woman I did vew, That ever to have toucht her, I did deadly rew.

41

“Her neather partes misshapen, monstruous, Were hidd in water, that I could not see, But they did seeme more foule and hideous, Then womans shape man would beleeve to bee. Thens forth from her most beastly companie I gan refraine, in minde to slipp away, Soone as appeard safe opportunitie: For danger great, if not assurd decay5 I saw before mine eyes, if I were knowne to stray.

42

“The divelish hag by chaunges of my cheare6 Perceiv’d my thoughts, and drownd in sleepie night, With wicked herbes and oyntments did besmeare My body all, through charmes and magicke might, That all my senses were bereaved quight: Then brought she me into this desert waste, And by my wretched lovers side me pight,7 Where now enclosd in wooden wals full faste, Banisht from living wights, our wearie daies we waste.”

43

“But how long time,” said then the Elfin knight, “Are you in this misformed hous to dwell?” “We may not chaunge” (quoth he) “this evill plight,

1

unweeting: unawares. Prime: probably spring. 3 proper hew: her own natural form. 4 origane and thyme: to heal scabs, with which Duessa is afflicted, as we learn at viii.47.8–9; as recommended in Gerarde, Herball; noted Todd, 1805. Thyme is the first 2

herb recommended in Fracastoro, Syphilis (2.174–75), as a cure for syphilis (ACH). 5 decay: destruction. 6 cheare: expression and/or mood (OED, “cheer,” 2 and 3). 7 pight: planted.

Canto Two

37

Till we be bathed in a living well;1 This is the terme prescribed by the spell.” “O how,” sayd he, “mote I that well out find, That may restore you to your wonted well?”2 “Time and suffised3 fates to former kynd Shall us restore, none else from hence may us unbynd.”4 44

The false Duessa, now Fidessa hight,5 Heard how in vaine Fradubio did lament, And knew well all was true. But the good knight Full of sad feare and ghastly dreriment,6 When all this speech the living tree had spent, The bleeding bough did thrust into the ground, That from the blood he might be innocent, And with fresh clay did close the wooden wound: Then turning to his Lady, dead with feare her fownd.

45

Her seeming dead he fownd with feigned feare, As all unweeting of that well she knew,7 And paynd himselfe with busie care to reare Her out of carelesse swowne.8 Her eylids blew And dimmed sight with pale and deadly hew At last she up gan lift: with trembling cheare9 Her up he tooke, too simple and too trew, And oft her kist. At length all passed feare, He set her on her steede, and forward forth did beare.

1

Redcrosse will be bathed in the lifegiving Well of Life in xi.29–30, an act that is identified as baptism. This hints that Fradubio and Fralissa are in need of baptism, but the meaning is not entirely clear. The present “living well” may be simply divine grace in general, as in John 4.13–4 and Rev. 22.1. 2 wonted well: usual state of well-being. 3 suffised: satisfied. 4 The literal meaning of this mythic prophecy is not entirely clear. The fates (read God?) are angry. They will eventually relent; then, and only then, they will restore the pair to former kynd—i.e., to their

former species. Allegorically, the prophecy seems to constitute a skewed myth of Adam’s fall and redemption, in which females are innocent but have to suffer with their mates. “Fates all satisfied” occurs in Merlin’s prophecy at III.iii.44.7. 5 hight: called. 6 dreriment: gloom. 7 I.e., as if ignorant of what she knew only too well. 8 carelesse swowne: unconscious, or, supposedly unconscious, swoon. 9 cheare: disposition as manifested by external demeanor (OED, “cheer,” 3).

Canto Three Forsaken Truth long seekes her love, And makes the Lyon mylde, Marres blind Devotions mart,1 and fals In hand of leachour vylde.

1

Nought is there under heav’ns wide hollownesse, That moves more deare compassion of mind, Then beautie brought t’unworthie wretchednesse Through envies snares or fortunes freakes unkind: I, whether lately through her2 brightnes blynd, Or through alleageance and fast fealty, Which I do owe unto all womankynd, Feele my hart perst with so great agony, When such I see, that all for pitty I could dy.

2

And now it is empassioned so deepe, For fairest Unaes sake, of whom I sing, That my frayle eies these lines with teares do steepe, To thinke how she through guylefull handeling Though true as touch,3 though daughter of a king, Though faire as ever living wight was fayre, Though nor in word nor deede ill meriting, Is from her knight divorced in despayre And her dew loves deryv’d4 to that vile witches shayre.

3

Yet she most faithfull Ladie all this while Forsaken, wofull, solitarie mayd Far from all peoples preace,5 as in exile, In wildernesse and wastfull deserts strayd,

1

for testing the quality of gold and silver alloys by the colour of the streak produced by rubbing them upon it” (OED, “touch,” 6, and “touchstone”). 4 deryv’d: diverted. 5 preace: gathering, congregating.

mart: traffic, business, projects. “To mar someone’s market” was a slang term for frustrating or disgracing them. 2 I.e., beauty’s. 3 true as touch: true as a touchstone: “A very smooth, fine-grained, black or darkcolored variety of quartz or jasper . . . used

38

Canto Three

39

To seeke her knight; who subtily betrayd Through that late vision, which th’Enchaunter wrought Had her abandond. She of nought affrayd, Through woods and wastnes wide him daily sought; Yet wished tydinges none of him unto her brought. 4

One day nigh wearie of the yrkesome way, From her unhastie beast she did alight, And on the grasse her dainty limbs did lay In secrete shadow, far from all mens sight: From her fayre head her fillet she undight,1 And layd her stole aside. Her angels face As the great eye of heaven shyned bright, And made a sunshine in the shady place; Did never mortall eye behold such heavenly grace.

5

It fortuned out of the thickest wood A ramping2 Lyon rushed suddeinly, Hunting full greedy after salvage blood;3 Soone as the royall virgin he did spy, With gaping mouth at her ran greedily, To have attonce devourd her tender corse: But to the pray when as he drew more ny, His bloody rage aswaged with remorse, And with the sight amazd, forgat his furious forse.

1

I.e., she took off her headband. ramping: rearing up to attack, as a “lion rampant” does in heraldry. The lion’s alliance with Una, whatever its meaning, partakes of folkore and myth. “Common lore maintains that ‘the lion will not touch the true prince’ (Shakespeare, 1 Henry IV, 2.4.271–72); that it protects virgins; and . . . aids the faithful. . .” (ACH). The lion is common in medieval romance, e.g., Guy of Warwick in the romance of that name; Percival in Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur; the virgin heroine of Bevis of Hampton (M&P); and Yvain in Chrétien’s romance of that name. Since he is good yet destructive, the meaning of Una’s lion is problematic. He breaks 2

the “wicket” of Abessa and Corceca and kills Abessa’s “sugar daddy.” According to another interpretation, “as primate of the beasts, Una’s lion represents the force of nature’s law, supporting neglected or despised truth” (M&P). See Richard Hooker’s “Sermon on Faith in the Elect” (delivered 1585–1586) in Works, 3:481: “Lions, beasts ravenous by nature, . . . have as it were religiously adored the very flesh of the faithful man.” For use of the lion in an erotic context, see Amoretti, 20.5–8: “the Lyon that is Lord of power . . . disdeigneth to devoure / The silly lambe that to his might doth yield” (ACH). 3 salvage blood: the blood of wild beasts.

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The Faerie Queene: Book One

6

In stead thereof he kist her wearie feet, And lickt her lilly hands with fawning tong, As he her wronged innocence did weet.1 O how can beautie maister the most strong, And simple truth subdue avenging wrong? Whose yielded pryde and proud submission, Still dreading death, when she had marked long, Her hart gan melt in great compassion, And drizling teares did shed for pure affection.

7

“The Lyon Lord of everie beast in field” Quoth she, “his princely puissance doth abate, And mightie proud to humble weake does yield, Forgetfull of the hungry rage, which late Him prickt, in pittie of my sad estate:2 But he my Lyon, and my noble Lord How does he find in cruell hart to hate Her that him lov’d, and ever most adord, As the God of my life? why hath he me abhord?”

8

Redounding teares did choke th’end of her plaint, Which softly ecchoed from the neighbour wood; And sad to see her sorrowfull constraint The kingly beast upon her gazing stood; With pittie calmd, downe fell his angry mood. At last in close hart shutting up her payne, Arose the virgin borne of heavenly brood,3 And to her snowy Palfrey got agayne, To seeke her strayed Champion, if she might attayne.4

9

The Lyon would not leave her desolate, But with her went along, as a strong gard Of her chast person, and a faythfull mate Of her sad troubles and misfortunes hard: Still when she slept, he kept both watch and ward, And when she wakt, he wayted diligent,

1

weet: know. estate: state. 3 heavenly brood: divine ancestry. See also iii.28.9 and x.9.3. Since Una’s parents are Adam and Eve, as we learn in vii.44 and II.i.1.5, perhaps Spenser refers to the fact 2

that God, while not precisely begetting them, created them with his own hands, without any mediating element; see Gen. 1.20–7. 4 attayne: attain him; i.e., overtake him.

Canto Three

41

With humble service to her will prepard: From her fayre eyes he tooke commandement, And ever by her lookes conceived her intent. 10

Long she thus traveiled through deserts wyde, By which she thought her wandring knight shold pas, Yet never shew of living wight espyde; Till that at length she found the troden gras, In which the tract1 of peoples footing was, Under the steepe foot of a mountaine hore; The same she followes, till at last she has A damzell spyde slow footing2 her before, That on her shoulders sad3 a pot of water bore.

11

To whom approching she to her gan call, To weet,4 if dwelling place were nigh at hand; But the rude wench her answerd nought at all, She could not heare, nor speake, nor understand;5 Till seeing by her side the Lyon stand, With suddeine feare her pitcher downe she threw, And fled away: for never in that land Face of fayre Lady she before did vew, And that dredd Lyons looke her cast in deadly hew.6

12

Full fast she fled, ne ever lookt behynd, As if her life upon the wager lay, And home she came, whereas her mother blynd7 Sate in eternall night: nought could she say,

1

tract: trace. slow footing: walking slowly. 3 sad: bent down, as if with sadness. 4 weet: learn. 5 Abessa’s inability to hear and understand alludes to the several passages in the gospels in which Christ laments that his hearers do not understand and employs metaphors of ears and hearing, e.g., Mark 4.9–12. That she cannot speak seems an addition to Scripture and perhaps refers to the reputed meekness and passivity of the Catholic rank and file, and of Catholic women generally. With her water pot, Abessa is also analogous to the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4.13) who, though she eventually under2

stands Christ, exhibits sexual immorality and spiritual obtuseness. The mountain may suggest Mount Sinai, where Moses received the Law (alluded to in x.53), because Corceca is legalistic in her devotions. See King, 54–6; “Abessa, Corceca, Kirkrapine” in SE. Compare Una’s selfish indifference to Abessa, Corceca, and Kirkrapine with her concern for the souls of the Satyrs in Canto Six. 6 I.e., made her turn as pale as a corpse. 7 Christ frequently calls his opponents blind; see note to 18.4 below. Ignorance was another fault that Protestants saw in the Catholic rank and file; see Ignaro (viii.30–37).

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The Faerie Queene: Book One

But suddeine catching hold did her dismay With quaking hands, and other signes of feare: Who full of ghastly fright and cold affray,1 Gan shut the dore. By this arrived there Dame Una, weary Dame, and entrance did requere.2 13

Which when none yielded, her unruly Page With his rude clawes the wicket3 open rent, And let her in; where of his cruell rage Nigh dead with feare, and faint astonishment, Shee found them both in darkesome corner pent; Where that old woman day and night did pray Upon her beads devoutly penitent; Nine hundred Pater nosters every day, And thrise nine hundred Aves she was wont to say.4

14

And to augment her painefull penaunce more, Thrise every weeke in ashes shee did sitt, And next her wrinkled skin rough sackecloth wore, And thrise three times did fast from any bitt: But now for feare her beads she did forgett. Whose needelesse dread for to remove away, Faire Una framed words and count’naunce fitt: Which hardly5 doen, at length she gan them pray, That in their cotage small that night she rest her may.6

15

The day is spent, and commeth drowsie night, When every creature shrowded is in sleepe; Sad Una downe her laies in weary plight,

1

affray: fear. requere: request. 3 wicket: a small door. I.e., he rent the wicket open. Evidently he did not completely destroy it, because it later presents an obstacle to Kirkrapine. 4 Spenser describes Corceca in terms of the defects of Catholic laity, ignorant and too legalistically ritualistic and quantitative in their approach to their devotions. She “thrice three times did fast from any bitt” (14.4). That she counts her prayers shows that she thinks they are meritorious and hence that God will be pleased by mere repetition. “Beads” can mean prayers, but 2

here they seem to be physical rosary beads on which prayers were counted. Ashes, sackcloth, and fasting are characteristic of Catholic devotion, though Protestants too believed in fasting—see the Hermit’s advice to Redcrosse in x.52—and Spenser apparently even endorsed sackcloth and ashes (x.26). The difference seems to be not in the practices themselves, but in the underlying attitude: Protestants focus on the heart and do not keep score. Corceca, however, seems at least to have been sincerely misled. 5 hardly: with difficulty. 6 I.e., that she may rest herself in their small cottage that night.

Canto Three

43

And at her feete the Lyon watch doth keepe: In stead of rest, she does lament, and weepe For the late losse of her deare loved knight, And sighes, and grones, and evermore does steepe Her tender brest in bitter teares all night, All night she thinks too long, and often lookes for light. 16

Now when Aldeboran was mounted hye Above the shinie Cassiopeias chaire,1 And all in deadly sleepe did drowned lye, One knocked at the dore, and in would fare;2 He knocked fast, and often curst, and sware, That ready entraunce was not at his call: For on his backe a heavy load he bare Of nightly stelths and pillage severall,3 Which he had got abroad by purchas criminall.4

17

He was to weete a stout and sturdy thiefe, Wont to robbe Churches of their ornaments, And poore mens boxes of their due reliefe, Which given was to them for good intents;5 The holy Saints of their rich vestiments He did disrobe, when all men carelesse slept, And spoild the Priests of their habiliments,6 Whiles none the holy things in safety kept;7 Then he by conning sleights in at the window crept.8

1 Aldeboran is a star in the constellation Taurus. Cassiopeia is a chair-shaped constellation. Aldeboran would be above Cassiopeia in the sky after midnight in late August or in the autumn. This is another instance of the astronomical way of telling time common in older literature. 2 fare: come. 3 severall: of various kinds. 4 purchas criminall: robbery. 5 Kirkrapine steals the money from the “poor box” or “alms-box” in the church— money that virtuous people had given for relief of the poor. Either a Catholic or a Protestant could have committed this crime.

6

habiliments: attire—here, vestments. Despoiling religious statues of those beautiful clothes in which pious Catholics customarily arrayed them, and stealing the rich vestments of the clergy from their closets were crimes committed chiefly by opportunistic Protestant iconoclasts against Catholic churches. In confirmation of the sympathy with the statues here implied, Spenser later condemns the Protestant vandalism of Catholic statues in the person of the Blatant Beast (VI.xii.25). 8 See John 10.1–2: “Verely, verely I say unto you, He that entreth not in by the doore into the sheepfold, but climeth up another way, he is a thiefe and a robber.” 7

44

The Faerie Queene: Book One

18

And all that he by right or wrong could find, Unto this house he brought, and did bestow Upon the daughter of this woman blind, Abessa daughter of Corceca slow,1 With whom he whoredome usd, that few did know, And fed her fatt with feast of offerings, And plenty, which in all the land did grow; Ne spared he to give her gold and rings: And now he to her brought part of his stolen things.

19

Thus long the dore with rage and threats he bett,2 Yet of those fearfull women none durst rize, The Lyon frayed them, him in to lett:3 He would no lenger stay him to advize,4 But open breakes the dore in furious wize, And entring is; when that disdainfull beast Encountring fierce, him suddein doth surprize, And seizing cruell clawes on trembling brest, Under his Lordly foot him proudly hath supprest.

20

Him booteth not resist, nor succour call, His bleeding hart is in the vengers hand, Who streight him rent in thousand peeces small, And quite dismembred hath: the thirsty land Dronke up his life; his corse left on the strand.5 His fearefull freends weare out the wofull night, Ne dare to weepe, nor seeme to understand The heavie hap,6 which on them is alight, Affraid, least to themselves the like mishappen might.

1

Abessa’s name could come from the Latin Ab-esse, to be absent. It also suggests “Abbess,” the female head of a religious house; and her dwelling somewhat resembles a nunnery. Corceca means blind heart, or, as the Argument says, “blind devotion,” a skewed echo of St. Paul’s criticism of the classical pagans in their degenerate state: “their foolish heart was ful of darkenesse” (Rom. 1.21; see also Eph. 4.17–8). Both women are foolish. 2 bett: past tense of “beat.” 3 I.e., the presence of the Lion made them afraid to get up and let him in.

4

I.e., he would not wait any longer to advise himself—i.e., to consider what to do. 5 strand: ground. 6 heavie hap: grievous accident. Some have suggested that in his rough treatment of Abessa, Corceca, and Kirkrapine, the lion represents Henry VIII—instigator of the English Reformation, yet also of the dissolution of the monasteries, an act which Spenser criticizes (see Ruins of Time, 418; Var. 207, on iii.5ff; King, 54–6; and SE, “Abessa, Corceca, Kirkrapine”).

Canto Three

21

Now when broad day the world discovered has, Up Una rose, up rose the lyon eke,1 And on their former journey forward pas, In waies unknowne, her wandring knight to seeke, With paines far passing that long wandring Greeke, That for his love refused deitye;2 Such were the labours of this Lady meeke, Still seeking him, that from her still did flye, Then furthest from her hope, when most she weened nye.

22

Soone as she parted thence, the fearfull twayne, That blind old woman and her daughter dear Came forth, and finding Kirkrapine3 there slayne, For anguish great they gan to rend their heare, And beat their brests, and naked flesh to teare. And when they both had wept and wayld their fill, Then forth they ran like two amazed deare, Halfe mad through malice, and revenging will, To follow her, that was the causer of their ill.

23

Whome overtaking, they gan loudly bray, With hollow houling, and lamenting cry, Shamefully at her rayling all the way, And her accusing of dishonesty, That was the flowre of faith and chastity; And still amidst her rayling she4 did pray, That plagues, and mischiefes, and long misery Might fall on her, and follow all the way, And that in endlesse error she might ever stray.

24

But when she saw her prayers nought prevaile, Shee backe retourned with some labour lost; And in the way, as shee did weepe and waile, A knight her mett in mighty armes embost,5 Yet knight was not for all his bragging bost,6

1

eke: also. I.e., Odysseus (Ulysses). Calypso promised him immortality, provided he stay with her forever, but he wanted to get home to his wife Penelope (and his family and estate); Homer, Odyssey, 5.203–4—one of the

2

45

few classical references in this book that are favorable. 3 Kirkrapine: church robbery. 4 I.e., Corceca. 5 embost: encased. 6 bost: boast.

46

The Faerie Queene: Book One

But subtill Archimag, that Una sought By traynes1 into new troubles to have toste: Of that old woman tidings he besought, If that of such a Lady shee could tellen ought. 25

Therewith she gan her passion to renew, And cry, and curse, and raile, and rend her heare, Saying, that harlott she too lately knew, That causd her shed so many a bitter teare, And so forth told the story of her feare: Much seemed he to mone her haplesse2 chaunce, And after for that Lady did inquere; Which being taught, he forward gan advaunce His fair enchaunted steed, and eke his charmed launce.

26

Ere long he came, where Una traveild slow, And that wilde Champion wayting her besyde: Whome seeing such, for dread hee durst not show Him selfe too nigh at hand, but turned wyde Unto an hil; from whence when she him spyde, By his like seeming shield her knight by name Shee weend it was,3 and towards him gan ride: Approching nigh she wist,4 it was the same, And with faire fearefull humblesse towards him shee came.

27

And weeping said, “Ah my long lacked Lord, Where have ye bene thus long out of my sight? Much feared I to have bene quite abhord, Or ought have done,5 that ye displeasen might, That should as death unto my deare heart light: For since mine eie your joyous sight did mis, My chearefull day is turnd to chearelesse night, And eke my night of death the shadow is; But welcome now my light, and shining lampe of blis.”

1

traynes: deceptions. haplesse: unlucky. 3 “I.e., by his shield, which seemed to be that of Redcrosse, she supposed him to be her own particular knight” (M&P). Archimago quickly assumes the role. Although she symbolizes truth, Una can be 2

deceived, which seems to characterize her as the human institution of the church, rather than truth in the abstract. 4 wist: knew. Supposition (“weend,” line 7) strengthens into knowledge (ACH). 5 ought have done: have done anything.

Canto Three

28

He thereto meeting said, “My dearest Dame, Far be it from your thought, and fro my wil, To thinke that knighthood I so much should shame, As you to leave, that have me loved stil, And chose in Faery court of meere goodwil, Where noblest knights were to be found on earth: The earth shall sooner leave her kindly skil To bring forth fruit, and make eternall derth, Then I leave you, my liefe, yborn of hevenly berth.1

29

“And sooth to say, why I lefte you so long, Was for to seeke adventure in straunge place, Where Archimago said a felon strong To many knights did daily worke disgrace; But knight he now shall never more deface, Good cause of mine excuse, that mote ye please2 Well to accept, and ever more embrace My faithfull service, that by land and seas Have vowd you to defend. Now then your plaint appease.”

30

His lovely words her seemd due recompence Of all her passed paines: one loving howre For many yeares of sorrow can dispence:3 A dram of sweete is worth a pound of sowre: Shee has forgott, how many a woeful stowre4 For him she late endurd; she speakes no more Of past: true is, that true love hath no powre To looken backe; his eies be fixt before. Before her stands her knight, for whom she toyld so sore.

31

Much like, as when the beaten marinere, That long hath wandred in the Ocean wide, Ofte soust in swelling Tethys saltish teare,5 And long time having tand his tawney hide,

1

my liefe: my beloved; yborn of hevenly berth: see note on 8.7. 2 mote ye please: may it please you. 3 Spenser frequently muses about whether love’s pleasures outweigh its pains, and he frequently concludes that certainty is unattainable because intense emotion either lengthens or shortens clock time.

4

47

stowre: time of turmoil and stress. “I.e., soaked by the ocean’s waves; as in I.i.3.9, Tethys, properly the consort of Oceanus, is identified with the ocean” itself (M&P).

5

48

The Faerie Queene: Book One

With blustring breath of Heaven, that none can bide, And scorching flames of fierce Orions hound,1 Soone as the port from far he has espide, His chearfull whistle merily doth sound, And Nereus crownes with cups; his mates him pledg around.2 32

Such joy made Una, when her knight she found; And eke th’enchaunter joyous seemde no lesse, Then the glad marchant, that does vew from ground His ship far come from watrie wildernesse, He hurles out vowes, and Neptune3 oft doth blesse: So forth they past, and all the way they spent Discoursing of her dreadful late distresse, In which he askt her, what the Lyon ment: Who told her all that fell4 in journey, as she went.

33

They had not ridden far, when they might see One pricking towards them with hastie heat, Full strongly armd, and on a courser free, That through his fiersnesse fomed all with sweat, And the sharpe yron5 did for anger eat, When his hot ryder spurd his chauffed6 side; His looke was sterne, and seemed still to threat Cruell revenge, which he in hart did hyde, And on his shield Sansloy 7 in bloody lines was dyde.

34

When nigh he drew unto this gentle payre And saw the Red-crosse, which the knight did beare, He burnt in fire, and gan eftsoones prepare Himselfe to batteill with his couched speare.8

1 The Dog Star Sirius, so called because it is ascendant in July and August, the dog days, the hottest months and therefore the months when dogs are most likely to go mad. 2 The captain pours out a libation to Nereus, god of the Aegean sea, and his subordinates drink a toast to him. 3 God of the sea. 4 fell: befell. 5 yron: the bit.

6

chauffed: hot through irritation, physical and emotional. 7 Sansloy: without law, lawless, esp. in his sexual appetite; see SE, “Sansfoy, Sansjoy, and Sansloy.” The three Sans brothers are the villains threatening Redcrosse and Una in the middle cantos. Only Sansloy lives on, seemingly invincible; he reappears at II.ii.18.1. 8 couched speare: a spear put horizontally in its rest for attack.

Canto Three

49

Loth was that other, and did faint through feare, To taste th’untryed dint of deadly steele; But yet his Lady did so well him cheare, That hope of new good hap he gan to feele; So bent1 his speare, and spurd his horse with yron heele. 35

But that proud Paynim2 forward came so ferce, And full of wrath, that with his sharphead speare Through vainly crossed shield he quite did perce,3 And had his staggering steed not shronke for feare, Through shield and body eke he should him beare: Yet so great was the puissance of his push, That from his sadle quite he did him beare:4 He tombling rudely downe to ground did rush, And from his gored wound a well of bloud did gush.

36

Dismounting lightly from his loftie steed, He to him lept, in minde to reave5 his life, And proudly said, “Lo there the worthie meed Of him, that slew Sansfoy with bloody knife; Henceforth his ghost freed from repining strife,6 In peace may passen over Lethe lake,7 When mourning altars purgd with enimies life, The black infernall Furies doen aslake:8 Life from Sansfoy thou tookst, Sansloy shall from thee take.”

1 bent: aimed, as Sansloy had done, by putting it in the rest. 2 Paynim: pagan, but in Spenser a synonym for Sarazin, as his brother Sansfoy is called in ii.12.6ff. 3 In the final analysis, the cross is not efficacious, perhaps because the wearer is unworthy of it. 4 I.e., Sansloy would have thrust the spear through his shield and his body as well. 5 reave: to wrest away. 6 repining strife: mournful restlessness, alluding to the classical belief that the ghost

of a murdered man cannot cross the Styx, but must wander until his murder is avenged. 7 Lethe lake: Spenser seems to be picturing it as a barrier to souls bound for Hades in place of the River Styx. “At v.10.5–6 this same soul is still ‘wayling by blacke Stygian lake,’ delayed through desire for revenge” (ACH). 8 I.e., when his murderer Redcrosse is killed, it will cleanse the altars that have been set afire in his memory and will appease the black infernal Furies (who see that murders are avenged)—a classical idea, as in Oedipus the King (lines 25–30, 95–107) by Sophocles and the Eumenides (passim) by Aeschylus.

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37

Therewith in haste his helmet gan unlace, Till Una cride, “O hold that heavie hand, Deare Sir, what ever that thou be in place:1 Enough is, that thy foe doth vanquisht stand Now at thy mercy: Mercy not withstand:2 For he is one the truest knight alive, Though conquered now he lye on lowly land, And whilest him fortune favourd, fayre did thrive In bloudy field: therefore of life him not deprive.”

38

Her piteous wordes might not abate his rage, But rudely rending up his helmet, would Have slayne him streight: but when he sees his age, And hoarie head of Archimago old, His hasty hand he doth amased hold, And halfe ashamed, wondred at the sight: For the old man well knew he, though untold,3 In charmes and magick to have wondrous might, Ne ever wont in field, ne in round lists to fight.4

39

And said, “Why Archimago, lucklesse syre, What doe I see? what hard mishap is this, That hath thee hether brought to taste mine yre? Or thine the fault, or mine the error is, In stead of foe to wound my friend amis?” He answered nought, but in a traunce still lay, And on those guilefull dazed eyes of his The cloude of death did sit. Which doen away,5 He left him lying so, ne would no lenger stay.

40

But to the virgin comes, who all this while Amased stands, her selfe so mockt6 to see By him, who has the guerdon7 of his guile,

1

I.e., whoever you are. I.e., do not refuse mercy. 3 I.e., without having to be told, demonstrating “the instinctive kinship among evil characters” (ACH); but it was not instinctive enough; see below. 4 I.e., he was not used to jousting, either in open country or within a tournament’s en2

closure. This scene is comic—two villains working against each other. Evil’s selfdefeating character amuses Spenser. 5 which doen away: when it went away and he showed signs of life. 6 mockt: exposed as naïve. 7 guerdon: reward; in this case, the just punishment.

Canto Three

51

For so misfeigning1 her true knight to bee: Yet is she now in more perplexitie, Left in the hand of that same Paynim2 bold, From whom her booteth not at all to flie;3 Who by her cleanly garment catching hold, Her from her Palfrey pluckt, her visage to behold. 41

But her fiers servant full of kingly aw And high disdaine, whenas his soveraine Dame So rudely handled by her foe he saw, With gaping jawes full greedy at him came, And ramping on his shield, did weene the same Have reft4 away with his sharp rending clawes: But he was stout, and lust did now inflame His corage more, that from his griping pawes He hath his shield redeemd,5 and forth his swerd he drawes.

42

O then too weake and feeble was the forse Of salvage6 beast, his puissance to withstand: For he was strong, and of so mightie corse,7 As ever wielded speare in warlike hand, And feates of armes did wisely understand. Eftsoones he perced through his chaufed8 chest With thrilling point of deadly yron brand,9 And launcht10 his Lordly hart: with death opprest He ror’d aloud, whiles life forsooke his stubborne brest.

43

Who now is left to keepe the forlorne maid From raging spoile of lawlesse victors will? Her faithfull gard remov’d, her hope dismaid, Her selfe a yielded pray to save or spill.11 He now Lord of the field, his pride to fill, With foule reproches, and disdaineful spight

1

misfeigning: falsely pretending. Paynim: pagan, Saracen. 3 I.e., to flee from him does not do her any good. 4 reft: snatched. 5 redeemd: regained by effort. 6 salvage: wild. 2

7

corse: body. chaufed: heated with anger. 9 I.e., with searching point of deadly iron sword. 10 launcht: pierced. 11 spill: destroy. 8

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Her vildly entertaines,1 and will or nill, Beares her away upon his courser light: Her prayers nought prevaile, his rage is more of might. 44

1

And all the way, with great lamenting paine, And piteous plaintes she filleth his dull eares, That stony hart could riven2 have in twaine, And all the way she wetts with flowing teares: But he enrag’d with rancor, nothing heares. Her servile beast3 yet would not leave her so, But followes her far off, ne ought he feares, To be partaker of her wandring woe, More mild in beastly kind,4 then that her beastly foe.

vildly entertaines: treats vilely, badly. riven: split. 3 servile beast: the ass on which she normally rides. 2

4 kind: in the old sense of nature or species.

Canto Four To sinfull hous of Pryde, Duessa guydes the faithfull knight, Where brothers death to wreak1 Sansjoy doth chaleng him to fight.

1

Young knight, what ever that dost armes professe, And through long labours huntest after fame, Beware of fraud, beware of ficklenesse, In choice, and chaunge of thy deare loved Dame, Least thou of her believe too lightly2 blame, And rash misweening3 doe thy hart remove: For unto knight there is no greater shame, Then lightnesse and inconstancie in love; That doth this Redcrosse knights ensample plainly prove.

2

Who after that he had faire Una lorne,4 Through light misdeeming of her loialtie, And false Duessa in her sted had borne,5 Called Fidess, and so supposd to be; Long with her traveild, till at last they see A goodly building, bravely garnished,6 The house of mightie Prince it seemd to be: And towards it a broad high way that led, All bare through peoples feet, which thether traveiled.7

3

Great troupes of people traveild thetherward Both day and night, of each degree and place,8 But few returned, having scaped hard,

1

5

wreak: avenge; i.e., to avenge his brother’s death. 2 too lightly: too hastily, so also “light misdeeming” in next stanza. 3 misweening: mistaken mistrust. 4 lorne: abandoned.

borne: carried off. Not literally, since Duessa has her own horse. 6 bravely garnished: nicely decorated. 7 See Matt. 7.13: “Enter ye in at the strait gate, for it is the wide gate, and broad way that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat.” 8 degree and place: social level.

53

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With balefull1 beggery, or foule disgrace, Which ever after in most wretched case, Like loathsome lazars,2 by the hedges lay. Thether Duessa badd him bend his pace: For she is wearie of the toilsom way, And also nigh consumed is the lingring day. 4

A stately Pallace built of squared bricke,3 Which cunningly was without morter laid, Whose wals were high, but nothing strong, nor thick And golden foile all over them displaid, That purest skye with brightnesse they dismaid: High lifted up were many loftie towres, And goodly galleries far over laid, Full of faire windowes, and delightful bowres; And on the top a Diall told the timely howres.4

5

It was a goodly heape5 for to behould, And spake the praises of the workmans witt; But full great pittie, that so faire a mould6 Did on so weake foundation ever sitt: For on a sandie hill, that still did flitt, And fall away, it mounted was full hie, That every breath of heaven shaked itt:7 And all the hinder partes, that few could spie, Were ruinous and old, but painted cunningly.

1

balefull: wretched. lazars: lepers. 3 See the House of Fortune in Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun, Romance of the Rose, 127–8. It has an unstable site, beautiful golden parts in front and ugly decaying parts in back, and an unstable mistress, the Goddess Fortune, who is said to have ruined many characters in history. 4 I.e., it identified each hour as it occurred. The dial is possibly a metonymy for a clock; but a literal sundial sometimes accompanied or replaced a clock on towers. “The clock indicates Time’s power over the edifice and 2

its inhabitants, i.e., over the fallen world. An evil parody of Gloriana’s Cleopolis and God’s New Jerusalem, Lucifera’s court opposes the House of Holiness (I.x)” (M&P). 5 heape: building; not in OED, but see the synonymous “pile,” sense 4. 6 mould: structure. 7 See Matt. 7.26–7: “every one that heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them not, shall be likened unto a foolish man, which built his house upon the sand: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house: and it fell: and great was the fall of it.”

Canto Four

6

Arrived there they passed in forth right; For still to all the gates stood open wide, Yet charge of them was to a Porter hight1 Cald Malvenù,2 who entrance none denide: Thence to the hall, which was on every side With rich array and costly arras dight:3 Infinite sortes of people did abide There waiting long, to win the wished sight Of her, that was the Lady of that Pallace bright.

7

By them they passe, all gazing on them round, And to the Presence4 mount; whose glorious vew Their frayle amazed senses did confound: In living Princes court none ever knew Such endlesse richesse, and so sumpteous shew; Ne Persia selfe, the nourse of pompous pride Like ever saw. And there a noble crew Of Lords and Ladies stood on every side, Which with their presence fayre, the place much beautifide.

8

High above all a cloth of State5 was spred, And a rich throne, as bright as sunny day, On which there sate most brave embellished With royall robes and gorgeous array, A mayden Queene, that shone as Titans6 ray, In glistring gold, and perelesse pretious stone; Yet her bright blazing beautie did assay7 To dim the brightnesse of her glorious throne, As envying her selfe, that too exceeding shone.

9

Exceeding shone, like Phoebus fayrest childe,8 That did presume his fathers fyrie wayne, And flaming mouthes of steedes unwonted wilde

1

hight: designated. Cf. Bienvenu, the French word for ”welcome.” Malvenù represents a parody of it. 3 arras: tapestry hangings on walls to stop drafts; dight: decked. 4 the Presence: an exaggeratedly reverent term for Lucifera on her throne. 5 cloth of State: canopy. 2

6

55

Titans: the sun’s. assay: seemed to try. 8 Phoebus fayrest childe: Phaeton, or Phaethon, who took the “wayne” or chariot of the sun belonging to his father Apollo for an unauthorized spin. When its unmanageable course threatened to set the world on fire, Jupiter killed him with lightning (Metamorphoses, 2.1–328). 7

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Through highest heaven with weaker hand to rayne; Proud of such glory and advancement vayne, While flashing beames do daze his feeble eyen, He leaves the welkin way1 most beaten playne, And rapt2 with whirling wheeles, inflames the skyen, With fire not made to burne, but fayrely for to shyne. 10

So proud she shyned in her princely state, Looking to heaven; for earth she did disdayne, And sitting high; for lowly3 she did hate: Lo under neath her scornefull feete, was layne A dreadfull Dragon with an hideous trayne,4 And in her hand she held a mirrhour bright, Wherein her face she often vewed fayne.5 And in her selfe-lov’d semblance tooke delight; For she was wondrous faire, as any living wight.

11

Of griesly Pluto she the daughter was, And sad Proserpina the Queene of hell; Yet did she thinke her pearelesse worth to pas That parentage, with pride so did she swell, And thundring Jove, that high in heaven doth dwell, And wield6 the world, she claymed for her syre, Or if that any else did Jove excell: For to the highest she did still aspyre, Or if ought higher were then that, did it desyre.

12

And proud Lucifera7 men did her call, That made her selfe a Queene, and crownd to be, Yet rightfull kingdome she had none at all, Ne heritage of native soveraintie,

1

welkin way: an imaginary path that the sun follows in the sky. 2 rapt: carried away. 3 lowly: lowliness. 4 trayne: here, tail. 5 fayne: happily. 6 wield: control. 7 Lucifera’s name and parentage link her with Satan, who is her chauffeur (see stanza 36 below). Yet the manifestations of her

pride here seem not to be against God, like Lucifer’s (Isa. 14.12–4), but against other people. She therefore seems to be pride in general, which could encompass both these different kinds of pride and could appropriately participate in the parade of the Seven Deadly Sins, beginning Stanza 18. “She is presumably the opposite of that other ‘mayden Queene,’ Elizabeth, but some suspect that Spenser’s satire does not quite exempt his monarch and her court” (M&P).

Canto Four

57

But did usurpe with wrong and tyrannie Upon the scepter, which she now did hold: Ne ruld her Realme with lawes, but pollicie,1 And strong advizement of six wisards old, That with their counsels bad her kingdome did uphold. 13

Soone as the Elfin knight in presence came, And false Duessa seeming Lady fayre, A gentle Husher,2 Vanitie by name Made rowme, and passage for them did prepaire: So goodly brought them to the lowest stayre Of her high throne, where they on humble knee Making obeysaunce, did the cause declare, Why they were come, her roiall state to see, To prove the wide report of her great Majestee.

14

With loftie eyes, halfe loth to looke so lowe, She thancked them in her disdainefull wise, Ne other grace vouchsafed them to showe Of Princesse worthy, scarse them bad arise. Her Lordes and Ladies all this while devise Themselves to setten forth to straungers sight: Some frounce their curled heare in courtly guise,3 Some prancke their ruffes, and others trimly dight4 Their gay attyre: each others greater pride does spight.5

15

Goodly they all that knight doe entertayne, Right glad with him to have increast their crew; But to Duess’ each one himselfe did payne All kindnesse and faire courtesie to shew; For in that court whylome6 her well they knew: Yet the stout Faery mongst the middest crowd7 Thought all their glorie vaine in knightly vew, And that great Princesse too exceeding prowd, That to strange knight no better countenance allowd.

1

pollicie: politics, political cunning. Husher: usher. 3 frounce: frizz; guise: manner, behavior. 4 prancke their ruffes: arrange in folds the stiff, disk-shaped collars worn by Elizabethan ladies and gentlemen on state occasions; dight: arrange. 2

5

I.e., each considers the other too proud and criticizes him or her for it. 6 whylome: formerly. 7 the middest crowd: the very middle of the crowd.

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16

Suddein upriseth from her stately place The roiall Dame, and for her coche doth call; All hurtlen1 forth, and she with princely pace, As faire Aurora in her purple pall, Out of the East the dawning day doth call: So forth she comes: her brightnes brode doth blaze; The heapes of people thronging in the hall, Doe ride each other,2 upon her to gaze: Her glorious glitterand3 light doth all mens eies amaze.

17

So forth she comes, and to her coche does clyme, Adorned all with gold, and girlonds4 gay, That seemd as fresh as Flora in her prime, And strove to match, in roiall rich array, Great Junoes golden chayre,5 the which they say The Gods stand gazing on, when she does ride To Joves high hous through heavens bras-paved way6 Drawne of fayre Pecocks, that excell in pride, And full of Argus eyes their tayles dispredden wide.7

18

But this was drawne of six unequall8 beasts, On which her six sage Counsellours did ryde, Taught to obay their bestiall beheasts,

1

hurtlen: rush in response to Lucifera’s whim. 2 ride each other: they literally climb on each other’s backs in order to get their heads high enough to see her, illustrating how ambition objectifies and uses other people. 3 glitterand: glittering. The “-nd” ending is an allowable, if somewhat medieval, variant. In this poem it is used only once more, to describe Arthur’s armor at vii.29.4. The hard d is less mellifluous than “-ng” and conjures up a radiance that is more glaring. 4 girlonds: garlands. 5 chayre: chariot. 6 heavens bras-paved way: the Milky Way, which, according to Ovid, is the road on which the gods travel in their chariots to the house of Jove (Metamorphoses, 1.168–71). Ovid says it is shining white, which would

more aptly be described as silver or pearl than brass. 7 Homer (Iliad, 5.720ff.) describes Juno’s chariot in this way, but Spenser also allegorizes the peacocks within another tradition as symbolizing pride. “Ovid (Metamorphoses, 1.590–726) tells how Juno set the hundred eyes of Argus, killed by Mercury at Jove’s command, in her peacock’s tail” (M&P)— an etiological myth. The smoothly lengthening Alexandrine mimes the gradual widening of the tails. 8 unequall: highly diverse in species and hence not an effective team. I.e., six of the deadly sins or capital vices (sinful tendencies), with Lucifera or pride representing the seventh, the originary sin. All six counselors and their emblematic mounts are hitched to Lucifera’s wagon or coach, which is driven by Satan. For primary sources and critics, see SE, “sins, deadly”;

Canto Four

59

With like conditions to their kindes1 applyde: Of which the first, that all the rest did guyde, Was sluggish Idlenesse the nourse of sin; Upon a slouthfull Asse he chose to ryde, Arayd in habit blacke, and amis2 thin, Like to an holy Monck, the service to begin. 19

And in his hand his Portesse3 still he bare, That much was worne, but therein little redd, For of devotion he had little care, Still drownd in sleepe, and most of his dais dedd; Scarse could he once uphold his heavie hedd, To looken, whether it were night or day: May seeme the wayne4 was very evill ledd, When such an one had guiding of the way, That knew not, whether right he went, or else astray.5

20

From worldly cares himselfe he did esloyne,6 And greatly shunned manly exercise, From everie worke he chalenged essoyne,7 For contemplation sake: yet otherwise, His life he led in lawlesse riotise; By which he grew to grievous malady; For in his lustlesse limbs through evill guise8 A shaking fever raignd continually: Such one was Idlenesse, first of this company.

21

And by his side rode loathsome Gluttony, Deformed creature, on a filthie swyne, His belly was upblowne with luxury; And eke with fatnesse swollen were his eyne,

for these and also individual symbols, see ACH notes on 18–35, both general and local; also Cullen, 14–5, 40–1. The attributes of the vices, with the exception of Sloth, are mostly traditional and difficult to trace to any one source. 1 kindes: species; i.e., the counselors resembled their respective mounts. 2 amis: priestly vestment or monk’s hood. 3 Portesse: breviary or prayer book. 4 wayne: wain, wagon, chariot.

5

Sloth has some nontraditional attributes here that associate him with monks. This constitutes anti-Catholic satire and seems to come from Stephen Bateman’s Cristall Glasse of Reformation (1590), a Protestant work; see illustration of Sloth from it in SE. 6 esloyne: withdrew himself from legal jurisdiction. 7 chalenged essoyne: claimed exemption. Like “esloyne” above, it is a legal term. 8 evill guise: debauched behavior.

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And like a Crane his necke was long and fyne,1 With which he swallowd up excessive feast, For want whereof poore people oft did pyne,2 And all the way, most like a brutish beast, He spued up his gorge, that all did him deteast. 22

In greene vine leaves he was right fitly clad; For other clothes he could not weare for heat, And on his head an yvie girland had, From under which fast trickled downe the sweat: Still as he rode, he somewhat3 still did eat, And in his hand did beare a bouzing can, Of which he supt so oft, that on his seat His dronken corse4 he scarse upholden can, In shape and life more like a monster, then a man.

23

Unfit he was for any worldly thing, And eke unhable once to stirre or go, Not meet to be of counsell to a king, Whose mind in meat and drinke was drowned so, That from his frend he seeldome knew his fo: Full of diseases was his carcas blew,5 And a dry dropsie6 through his flesh did flow, Which by misdiet daily greater grew: Such one was Gluttony, the second of that crew.

24

And next to him rode lustfull Lechery, Upon a bearded Gote, whose rugged heare, And whally7 eies (the signe of gelosy,) Was like the person selfe, whom he did beare: Who rough, and blacke, and filthy did appeare, Unseemely man to please faire Ladies eye; Yet he of Ladies oft was loved deare, When fairer faces were bid standen by: O who does know the bent of womens fantasy?

1

fyne: thin. There is a traditional story that a glutton wished his neck were as long as a crane’s so that he could savor his food longer. 2 pyne: starve. 3 somewhat: something.

4

corse: body. blew: livid. 6 dry dropsie: a disease that causes excessive thirst. 7 whally: showing much white, glaring. 5

Canto Four

25

In a greene gowne he clothed was full faire, Which underneath did hide his filthinesse, And in his hand a burning hart he bare, Full of vaine follies, and new fanglenesse;1 For he was false, and fraught with ficklenesse, And learned had to love with secret lookes, And well could daunce, and sing with ruefulnesse, And fortunes tell, and read in loving bookes,2 And thousand other waies, to bait his fleshly hookes.

26

Inconstant man, that loved all he saw, And lusted after all, that he did love, Ne would his looser life be tide to law, But joyd weake wemens hearts to tempt, and prove If from their loyall loves he might them move; Which lewdnes fild him with reprochfull pain Of that foule evill,3 which all men reprove, That rotts the marrow, and consumes the braine: Such one was Lechery, the third of all this traine.

27

And greedy Avarice by him did ride, Uppon a Camell4 loaden all with gold; Two iron coffers hong on either side, With precious metall full, as they might hold, And in his lap an heap of coine he told;5 For of his wicked pelfe6 his God he made, And unto hell him selfe for money sold; Accursed usury was all his trade, And right and wrong ylike in equall ballaunce waide.7

28

His life was nigh unto deaths dore yplaste, And thred-bare cote, and cobled shoes hee ware, Ne scarse good morsell all his life did taste, But both from backe and belly still did spare,

1

new fanglenesse: here, sexual infidelity. loving bookes: handbooks on the art of love. 3 foule evill: venereal disease. 4 Spenser gives him this mount in order to call to mind Christ’s statement that “it is easier for a camell to go through the eye of 2

61

a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdome of God.” See Matt. 19.24; Mark 10.25; Luke 18.25. 5 told: counted. 6 pelfe: a contemptuous term for wealth. 7 I.e., he didn’t care whether he did right or wrong, so long as it made money.

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To fill his bags, and richesse to compare;1 Yet childe ne kinsman living had he none To leave them to; but thorough daily care To get, and nightly feare to lose his owne, He led a wretched life unto him selfe unknowne.2 29

Most wretched wight, whom nothing might suffise, Whose greedy lust did lacke in greatest store, Whose need had end, but no end covetise, Whose welth was want, whose plenty made him pore, Who had enough, yett wished ever more, A vile disease, and eke in foote and hand A grievous gout tormented him full sore, That well he could not touch, nor goe, nor stand: Such one was Avarice, the forth of this faire band.

30

And next to him malicious Envy rode, Upon a ravenous wolfe, and still did chaw Betweene his cankred3 teeth a venemous tode, That all the poison ran about his chaw;4 But inwardly he chawed his owne maw5 At neibors welth, that made him ever sad; For death it was, when any good he saw, And wept, that cause of weeping none he had, But when he heard of harme, he wexed6 wondrous glad.

31

All in a kirtle of discolourd say7 He clothed was, ypaynted full of eies; And in his bosome secretly there lay An hatefull Snake, the which his taile uptyes In many folds, and mortall sting implyes.8 Still as he rode, he gnasht his teeth, to see Those heapes of gold with griple9 Covetyse, And grudged at the great felicitee Of proud Lucifera, and his owne companee.

1

compare: to obtain, from Latin comparare. unto him selfe unknowne: he lacks the self-knowledge to perceive what a wretched life his avarice has created. 3 cankred: infected. 4 chaw: jaw. 5 maw: stomach. 2

6

wexed: became—past tense of the verb “wax.” 7 a kirtle of discolourd say: a multicolored outer garment of a close-woven material like serge. 8 implyes: enfolds, from Latin implicare. 9 griple: greedy, tenacious.

Canto Four

32

He hated all good workes and vertuous deeds, And him no lesse, that any like did use,1 And who with gratious bread the hungry feeds, His almes for want of faith he doth accuse; So every good to bad he doth abuse:2 And eke the verse of famous Poets witt He does backebite, and spightfull poison spues From leprous mouth on all, that ever writt: Such one vile Envy was, that fifte in row did sitt.

33

And him beside rides fierce revenging Wrath, Upon a Lion, loth for to be led; And in his hand a burning brond3 he hath, The which he brandisheth about his hed; His eies did hurle forth sparcles fiery red, And stared sterne on all, that him beheld, As ashes pale of hew and seeming ded; And on his dagger still his hand he held, Trembling through hasty rage, when choler4 in him sweld.

34

His ruffin raiment all was staind with blood, Which he had spilt, and all to rags yrent,5 Through unadvized rashnes woxen wood;6 For of his hands he had no governement, Ne car’d for blood in his avengement: But when the furious fitt was overpast, His cruell facts7 he often would repent; Yet wilfull man he never would forecast, How many mischieves should ensue his heedlesse hast.

35

Full many mischiefes follow cruell Wrath; Abhorred bloodshed, and tumultuous strife, Unmanly murder, and unthrifty scath,8 Bitter despight, with rancours rusty knife,

1

that any like did use: anyone that did perform them. 2 abuse: make it appear bad. The personification of envy recurs frequently in the poem, perhaps because this vice, by making people reluctant to acknowledge achievement, subverts the entire honor system. 3 brond: sometimes sword, but here probably brand.

63

4 choler: the inward disposition, or “humor,” that expresses itself in wrath. 5 yrent: torn. 6 wood: crazy. 7 facts: deeds. 8 unmanly: inhuman; unthrifty scath: self-destructive harm.

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And fretting griefe the enemy of life; All these, and many evils moe haunt ire, The swelling Splene,1 and Frenzy raging rife, The shaking Palsey, and Saint Fraunces fire:2 Such one was Wrath, the last of this ungodly tire.3 36

And after all upon the wagon beame4 Rode Sathan, with a smarting whip in hand, With which he forward lasht the laesy5 teme, So oft as Slowth still in the mire did stand. Huge routs6 of people did about them band, Showting for joy, and still before their way A foggy mist had covered all the land; And underneath their feet, all scattered lay Dead sculls and bones of men, whose life had gone astray.

37

So forth they marchen in this goodly sort, To take the solace of the open aire, And in fresh flowring fields themselves to sport; Emongst the rest rode that false Lady faire, The foule Duessa, next unto the chaire Of proud Lucifer’, as one of the traine: But that good knight would not so nigh repaire,7 Him selfe estraunging from their joyaunce vaine, Whose fellowship seemd far unfitt for warlike swaine.

38

So having solaced themselves a space, With pleasaunce of the breathing8 fields yfed, They backe retourned to the princely Place; Whereas an errant9 knight in armes ycled,

1 Splene: in Renaissance physiology, the organ responsible for wrath. 2 Saint Fraunces fire: an unknown disease; Spenser presumably meant St. Anthony’s fire (ACH). It is called erysipelas, which Thomas Cooper defines as, “An inflammation or sore with redness rounde about, which procedeth of choler and causeth a fever in the bodie.” 3 tire: not in OED, but presumably means “procession.”

4 beame: the beam or tongue of Lucifera’s coach or wagon, to which the six counselors and their mounts are hitched. Since we have already been treated to a portrait of Lucifera, or pride, none is given here. 5 laesy: lazy. 6 routs: crowds. 7 repaire: betake himself; as yet, Redcrosse still disapproves and holds himself aloof. 8 breathing: exhaling fragrance. 9 errant: on a quest, wandering.

Canto Four

65

And heathnish shield, wherein with letters red Was writt Sansjoy, they new arrived find: Enflam’d with fury and fiers hardy hed,1 He seemd in hart to harbour thoughts unkind, And nourish bloody vengeaunce in his bitter mind. 39

Who when the shamed shield of slaine Sansfoy He spide with that same Fary champions page, Bewraying2 him, that did of late destroy His eldest brother, burning all with rage He to him lept, and that same envious gage3 Of victors glory from him snacht away: But th’Elfin knight, which ought that warlike wage,4 Disdaind to loose the meed he wonne in fray, And him rencountring fierce, reskewd the noble pray.

40

Therewith they gan to hurtlen5 greedily, Redoubted battaile ready to darrayne,6 And clash their shields, and shake their swerds on hy, That with their sturre they troubled all the traine; Till that great Queene upon eternall paine Of high displeasure, that ensewen might, Commaunded them their fury to refraine, And if that either to that shield had right, In equall lists7 they should the morrow next it fight.

41

“Ah dearest Dame,” quoth then the Paynim bold, “Pardon the error of enraged wight, Whome great griefe made forgett the raines to hold Of reasons rule, to see this recreaunt knight, No knight, but treachour full of false despight And shameful treason, who through guile hath slayn

1

hardy hed: boldness. bewraying: unconsciously revealing. 3 envious gage: envied pledge. 4 ought that warlike wage: owned that spoil of war. 5 to hurtlen: here, to rush together; see “All hurtlen” in iv.16.3; “-en” is the sign of 2

both the infinitive and the present plural in Middle English. 6 darrayne: “engage in order to vindicate a claim (a legal term)” (ACH). 7 in equall lists: in impartial formal combat.

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The prowest1 knight, that ever field did fight, Even stout Sansfoy (O who can then refrayn?) Whose shield he beares renverst,2 the more to heap disdayn. 42

“And to augment the glorie of his guile, His dearest love the faire Fidessa loe Is there possessed of the traytour vile, Who reapes the harvest sowen by his foe, Sowen in bloodie field, and bought with woe: That brothers hand shall dearely well requight So be,3 O Queene, you equall favour showe.” Him litle answerd th’angry Elfin knight; He never meant with words, but swords to plead his right.

43

But threw his gauntlet as a sacred pledg, His cause in combat the next day to try: So been they parted both, with harts on edg, To be aveng’d each on his enimy. That night they pas in joy and jollity, Feasting and courting both in bowre and hall; For Steward was excessive Gluttony, That of his plenty poured forth to all; Which doen, the Chamberlain Slowth did to rest them call.

44

Now whenas darkesome night had all displayd Her coleblacke curtein over brightest skye, The warlike youthes on dayntie couches layd, Did chace away sweet sleepe from sluggish eye, To muse on meanes of hoped victory. But whenas Morpheus had with leaden mace, Arrested all that courtly company, Uprose Duessa from her resting place, And to the Paynims lodging comes with silent pace.

45

Whom broad awake she findes, in troublous fitt,4 Forecasting, how his foe he might annoy, And him amoves with speaches seeming fitt:

1

prowest: the knight with the most prowess or fighting ability. 2 renverst: upside down or inside out in token of defeat.

3 4

So be: if. fitt: mood.

Canto Four

67

“Ah deare Sansjoy, next dearest to Sansfoy, Cause of my new griefe, cause of my new joy, Joyous, to see his ymage in mine eye, And greevd, to thinke how foe did him destroy, That was the flowre of grace and chevalrye; Lo his Fidessa to thy secret faith I flye.” 46

With gentle wordes he can1 her fayrely greet, And bad say on the secrete of her hart. Then sighing soft, “I learne that litle sweet Oft tempted is,” (quoth she) “with muchell smart: For since my brest was launcht2 with lovely dart Of deare Sansfoy, I never joyed howre, But in eternall woes my weaker3 hart Have wasted, loving him with all my powre, And for his sake have felt full many an heavie stowre.

47

“At last when perils all I weened past, And hop’d to reape the crop of all my care, Into new woes unweeting I was cast, By this false faytor, who unworthie ware4 His worthie shield, whom he with guilefull snare Entrapped slew, and brought to shamefull grave. Me silly5 maid away with him he bare, And ever since hath kept in darksom cave, For that I would not yeeld, that to Sansfoy I gave.6

48

“But since faire Sunne hath sperst7 that lowring clowd, And to my loathed life now shewes some light, Under your beames I will me safely shrowd, From dreaded storme of his disdainfull spight: To you th’inheritance belonges by right Of brothers prayse, to you eke longes8 his love.

1

can: did. launcht: pierced. 3 weaker: too weak. 4 faytor: imposter; ware: wore. 5 silly: innocent. 6 I.e., because I would not yield to Red2

crosse that which I gave to Sansfoy. This proves Duessa was lying when she told Redcrosse that she never yielded her “fort” to Sansfoy (ii.25). 7 sperst: dispersed. 8 longes: belongs.

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Let not his love, let not his restlesse spright, Be unreveng’d, that calles to you above From wandring Stygian1 shores, where it doth endlesse move.” 49

Thereto said he, “faire Dame be nought dismaid For sorrowes past; their griefe is with them gone: Ne yet of present perill be affraid: For needlesse feare did never vantage none,2 And helplesse hap it booteth not to mone. Dead is Sansfoy, his vitall paines3 are past, Though greeved ghost for vengeance deep do grone He lives, that shall him pay his dewties last,4 And guiltie Elfin blood shall sacrifice in hast.”

50

“O But I feare the fickle freakes”5 (quoth shee) “Of fortune false, and oddes of armes in field.” “Why dame” (quoth he) “what oddes can ever bee, Where both doe fight alike, to win or yield?” “Yea but” (quoth she) “he beares a charmed shield, And eke enchaunted armes, that none can perce, Ne none can wound the man, that does them wield.” “Charmed or enchaunted” (answerd he then ferce)6 “I no whitt reck, ne you the like need to reherce.7

51

“But faire Fidessa, sithens8 fortunes guile, Or enimies powre hath now captived you, Returne from whence ye came, and rest a while Till morrow next, that I the Elfe subdew, And with Sansfoyes dead dowry you endew.”9 “Ay me, that is a double death” (she said) “With proud foes sight my sorrow to renew: Where ever yet I be, my secrete aide Shall follow you.” So passing forth she him obaid.

1

Stygian: of the river Styx, which surrounded classical Hades, and to the land side of which were consigned the spirits of those who either lacked proper burial or were murdered but unavenged. See also notes on Lethe Lake and the Furies, above at iii.36. 2 did never vantage none: never did any good to anyone. 3 vitall paines: the pains he suffered in life.

4

pay his dewties last: that shall do for him the last duty; i.e., avenging his murder. 5 freakes: whims. 6 ferce: fiercely. 7 I.e., I do not care at all and you do not need to tell me about it. 8 sithens: since. 9 I.e., “endow you with the dowry of the dead Sansfoy” (M&P).

Canto Five The faithfull knight in equall field subdewes his faithlesse foe, Whom false Duessa saves, and for his cure to hell does goe.

1

The noble hart, that harbours vertuous thought, And is with childe of 1 glorious great intent, Can never rest, untill it forth have brought Th’eternall brood of glorie excellent: Such restlesse passion did all night torment The flaming corage of that Faery knight, Devizing, how that doughtie turnament With greatest honour he atcheiven might; Still did he wake, and still did watch for dawning light.

2

At last the golden Orientall gate Of greatest heaven gan to open fayre, And Phoebus fresh, as brydegrome to his mate, Came dauncing forth, shaking his deawie hayre: And hurld his glistring beams through gloomy ayre. Which when the wakeful Elfe perceivd, streight way He started up, and did him selfe prepayre, In sunbright armes, and battailous array:2 For with that Pagan proud he combatt will that day.

3

And forth he comes into the commune hall, Where earely waite him many a gazing eye, To weet what end to straunger knights may fall. There many Minstrales maken melody, To drive away the dull melancholy, And many Bardes, that to the trembling chord

1 with childe of: travailing in birth with. Elizabethan writers generally and Spenser in particular employ metaphors of feminine

experience, such as insemination, pregnancy, childbearing, and lactation. 2 battailous array: warlike equipment.

69

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Can tune their timely1 voices cunningly, And many Chroniclers, that can record Old loves, and warres for Ladies doen by many a Lord. 4

Soone after comes the cruell Sarazin, In woven maile all armed warily, And sternly lookes at him, who not a pin Does care for looke of living creatures eye. They bring them wines of Greece and Araby, And daintie spices fetcht from furthest Ynd,2 To kindle heat of corage privily:3 And in the wine a solemne oth they bynd T’observe the sacred lawes of armes, that are assynd.

5

At last forth comes that far renowmed Queene, With royall pomp and princely majestie; She is ybrought unto a paled4 greene, And placed under stately canapee, The warlike feates of both those knights to see. On th’other side in all mens open vew Duessa placed is, and on a tree Sansfoy his shield is hangd with bloody hew: Both those the lawrell girlonds to the victor dew.5

6

A shrilling trompett sownded from on hye, And unto battaill bad them selves addresse:6 Their shining shieldes about their wrestes7 they tye, And burning blades about their heades doe blesse,8 The instruments of wrath and heavinesse: With greedy force each other doth assayle, And strike so fiercely, that they doe impresse Deepe dinted furrowes in the battred mayle: The yron walles to ward their blowes are weak and fraile.

1

timely: measured. Ynd: East Indies. 3 privily: inwardly. 4 paled: fenced. 5 Duessa and the shield of Sansfoy take the place of the laurel garlands usually given to victors. Metaphor. 2

6

I.e., bade or told them to address themselves. 7 wrestes: wrists. 8 blesse: brandish, flourish.

Canto Five

7

The Sarazin was stout, and wondrous strong, And heaped blowes like yron hammers great: For after blood and vengeance he did long. The knight was fiers, and full of youthly heat, And doubled strokes, like dreaded thunders threat: For all for praise and honour he did fight, Both stricken stryke, and beaten both doe beat, That from their shields forth flyeth firie light, And hewen helmets deepe shew marks of eithers might.

8

So th’one for wrong, the other strives for right: As when a Gryfon1 seized of his pray, A Dragon fiers encountreth in his flight, Through widest ayre making his ydle way, That would his rightfull ravine2 rend away: With hideous horror both together smight, And souce so sore, that they the heavens affray:3 The wise Southsayer seeing so sad sight, Th’amazed vulgar telles of warres and mortall fight.4

9

So th’one for wrong, the other strives for right, And each to deadly shame would drive his foe: The cruell steele so greedily doth bight In tender flesh, that streames of blood down flow, With which the armes, that earst5 so bright did show Into a pure vermillion now are dyde: Great ruth in all the gazers harts did grow, Seeing the gored woundes to gape so wyde, That victory they dare not wish to either side.

10

At last the Paynim chaunst to cast his eye, His suddein eye,6 flaming with wrathfull fyre, Upon his brothers shield, which hong thereby:

1 A huge and mythical monster combining the body of a lion with the head and wings of an eagle. 2 ravine: captured prey. 3 souce: strike; affray: affect, e.g., as with an eclipse. For comparable celestial hyperboles, see “And molten starres doe droppe like weeping eyes,” etc., vi.6.5–8.

4

71

I.e., the wise prophet or soothsayer, seeing a sight so sad, tells the amazed common people that war and mortal battle are impending. 5 earst: formerly. 6 suddein eye: quick-glancing eye.

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Therewith redoubled was his raging yre, And said, “Ah wretched sonne of wofull syre, Doest thou sit wayling by blacke Stygian lake, Whylest here thy shield is hangd for victors hyre, And sluggish german doest thy forces slake,1 To after-send his foe, that him may overtake? 11

“Goe caytive2 Elfe, him quickly overtake, And soone redeeme from his long wandring woe, Goe guiltie ghost, to him my message make, That I his shield have quit3 from dying foe.” Therewith upon his crest he stroke him so, That twise he reeled, readie twise to fall; End of the doubtfull battaile deemed tho4 The lookers on, and lowd to him gan call The false Duessa, “Thine the shield, and I, and all.”5

12

Soone as the Faerie heard his Ladie speake, Out of his swowning dreame he gan awake, And quickning faith, that earst was woxen6 weake, The creeping deadly cold away did shake: Tho mov’d with wrath, and shame, and Ladies sake, Of all attonce he cast7 avengd to be, And with so’exceeding furie at him strake, That forced him to stoupe upon his knee; Had he not stouped so, he should have cloven bee.

1

german: brother; doest thy forces slake: slackens the force he ought to be exercising on your behalf. “Sansjoy’s reaction recalls that of Aeneas, who, momentarily inclined to spare the defeated Turnus, is once again roused to fury by the sight of the dead Pallas’s sword belt on the shoulder of Turnus” (M&P; Aeneid, 12.938–52). 2 caytive: base. 3 quit: recovered. Alludes to the tradition that a spirit of a dead person cannot cross the Styx and enter Hades, but must wander until certain duties are performed—here, avenging the dead person’s murder.

4

tho: then. In “lowd to him” and “Thine the shield,” the antecedents of “him” and “Thine” hover ambiguously between Redcrosse and Sansloy; neither Spenser nor Duessa will say whom she is encouraging. Although Sansjoy currently has the upper hand and is therefore the most likely candidate, in the next stanza the unsuspecting Redcrosse applies it to himself and is inspired to win thereby. The satire is on him and, perhaps, on chivalry itself. 6 earst was woxen: formerly had become. 7 cast: planned. 5

Canto Five

13

And to him said, “Goe now proud Miscreant, Thy selfe thy message do to german deare,1 Alone he wandring thee too long doth want: Goe say, his foe thy shield with his doth beare.” Therewith his heavie hand he high gan reare, Him to have slaine; when lo a darkesome clowd Upon him fell: he no where doth appeare, But vanisht is. The Elfe him calls alowd, But answer none receives: the darkness him does shrowd.2

14

In haste Duessa from her place arose, And to him running sayd, “O prowest3 knight, That ever Ladie to her love did chose, Let now abate the terrour of your might, And quench the flame of furious despight, And bloodie vengeance; lo th’infernall powres Covering your foe with cloud of deadly night, Have borne him hence to Plutoes balefull bowres.4 The conquest yours, I yours, the shield, and glory yours.”

15

Not all so satisfide, with greedy eye He sought all round about, his thirsty blade To bathe in blood of faithlesse enimy; Who all that while lay hid in secret shade: He standes amazed, how he thence should fade. At last the trumpets Triumph sound on hie, And running Heralds humble homage made, Greeting him goodly with new victorie, And to him brought the shield, the cause of enmitie.

16

Wherewith he goeth to that soveraine Queene, And falling her before on lowly knee, To her makes present of his service seene: Which she accepts, with thankes, and goodly gree,5

1

do: deliver; german deare: your dear relative. 2 The motif of a god (or in this case, a sorceress) sending a cloud to rescue a favorite warrior in danger has parallels in Homer,

73

Iliad, 3.380; Aeneid 5.808–11; and GL, 7.44–45. 3 prowest: superlative of prow; having the most prowess. 4 balefull bowres: deathly chambers. 5 gree: favor.

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Greatly advauncing1 his gay chevalree. So marcheth home, and by her takes the knight,2 Whom all the people followe with great glee, Shouting, and clapping all their hands on hight, That all the ayre it fils, and flyes to heaven bright. 17

Home is he brought, and layd in sumptuous bed: Where many skilfull leaches him abide,3 To salve his hurts, that yet still freshly bled. In wine and oyle they wash his woundes wide, And softly can embalme4 on everie side. And all the while, most heavenly melody About the bed sweet musicke did divide,5 Him to beguile of griefe and agony: And all the while Duessa wept full bitterly.

18

As when a wearie traveiler that strayes By muddy shore of broad seven-mouthed Nile, Unweeting of the perillous wandring wayes, Doth meete a cruell craftie Crocodile, Which in false griefe hyding his harmefull guile, Doth weepe full sore, and sheddeth tender teares: The foolish man, that pitties all this while His mournefull plight, is swallowd up unwares, Forgetfull of his owne, that mindes anothers cares.

19

So wept Duessa untill eventyde, That6 shyning lampes in Joves high house were light: Then forth she rose, ne lenger would abide, But comes unto the place, where th’Hethen knight In slombring swownd nigh voyd of vitall spright,7 Lay cover’d with inchaunted cloud all day:

1

advauncing: praising. I.e., takes Redcrosse by her in her coach, which symbolizes pride in the sin parade. He has been sucked into Lucifera’s superficial society (cf. his earlier aloofness) and has, in particular, felt pride. 3 leaches him abide: doctors wait for him. 4 can embalme: did anoint. 2

5 musicke did divide: did run a division, did sing or play a descant—a melody harmonizing with the main melody. 6 that: when. 7 I.e., in a slumbering swoon with his vital spirit almost gone. Vital spirit probably means “the breath of life,” “the animating or vital principle in men (and animals)” (OED).

Canto Five

75

Whom when she found, as she him left in plight,1 To wayle his wofull case she would not stay, But to the Easterne coast of heaven makes speedy way. 20

Where griesly Night,2 with visage deadly sad, That Phoebus chearefull face durst never vew, And in a foule blacke pitchy mantle clad, She findes forth comming from her darksome mew,3 Where she all day did hide her hated hew. Before the dore her yron charot4 stood, Already harnessed for journey new; And coleblacke steedes yborne of hellish brood, That on their rusty bits did champ, as they were wood.5

21

Who when she saw Duessa sunny bright, Adornd with gold and jewels shining cleare, She greatly grew amazed at the sight, And th’unacquainted light began to feare: For never did such brightnes there appeare, And would have backe retyred to her cave, Untill the witches speach she gan to heare, Saying, “yet O thou dreaded Dame, I crave Abyde, till I have told the message, which I have.”

22

She stayd, and foorth Duessa gan proceede, “O thou most auncient Grandmother of all, More old then Jove, whom thou at first didst breede, Or that great house of Gods caelestiall, Which wast begot in Daemogorgons hall, And sawst the secrets of the world unmade,

1

I.e., when she found him in the same plight as that in which she had left him. His condition, while serious, was stable. 2 Spenser derives Night’s origin, age, and appearance from data in Comes, Mythologia, 3.12, but he adds subjective depth to her speeches. “She numbers among her descendants Duessa and Aveugle, father of the three Sans brothers. . . . She is the eldest of the gods because she existed before the world was formed and before the Olympian gods were begotten in Demogorgon’s hall

(chaos). . . . See I.i.37–38 and iv.2.47” (TPR). She is not just the complement of day as in VII.vii.44, but primeval chaos or even nothingness—hence an appropriate ancestor for three brothers named “Sans-,” or “without.” Night accedes to Duessa’s request and the two women go back and fetch Sansjoy, who has been lying on the field in the cloud. 3 mew: den, narrow place. 4 charot: chariot. 5 wood: mad, crazy.

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Why suffredst thou thy Nephewes deare to fall1 With Elfin sword, most shamefully betrade? Lo where the stout Sansjoy doth sleepe in deadly shade. 23

“And him before, I saw with bitter eyes The bold Sansfoy shrinck underneath his speare; And now the pray of fowles in field he lyes, Nor wayld of friends, nor layd on groning beare,2 That whylome was to me too dearely deare. O what of Gods then boots it to be borne, If old Aveugles sonnes so evill heare?3 Or who shall not great Nightes children scorne, When two of three her Nephews are so fowle forlorne?

24

“Up then, up dreary Dame, of darknes Queene, Go gather up the reliques of thy race, Or else goe them avenge, and let be seene, That dreaded Night in brightest day hath place, And can the children of fayre light deface.” Her feeling speaches some compassion mov’d In hart, and chaunge in that great mothers face: Yet pitty in her hart was never prov’d Till then: for evermore she hated, never lov’d.

25

And said, “Deare daughter rightly may I rew The fall of famous children borne of mee, And good successes, which their foes ensew:4 But who can turne the streame of destinee, Or breake the chayne of strong necessitee, Which fast is tyde to Joves eternall seat. The sonnes of Day he favoureth, I see, And by my ruines thinkes to make them great: To make one great by others losse, is bad excheat.5

1

Nephewes: grandsons, here and passim. beare: bier. 3 so evill heare: are not esteemed (Latin: audire male) (TPR). “Aveugle” means blind. He is the father of the three Sans- brothers—one of whom is dead, while this one is on point of death. 2

4

which their foes ensew: which attend their foes. 5 excheat: a variant spelling of “escheat,” a legal term; forfeiture, esp. of goods to the king when there is no legal heir.

Canto Five

26

“Yet shall they not escape so freely all; For some shall pay the price of others guilt: And he the man that made Sansfoy to fall, Shall with his owne blood price, that he hath spilt.1 But what art thou, that telst of Nephews kilt?” “I that do seeme not I, Duessa ame,” Quoth she, “how ever now in garments gilt, And gorgeous gold arrayd I to thee came; Duessa I, the daughter of Deceipt and Shame.”

27

Then bowing downe her aged backe, she kist The wicked witch, saying, “In that fayre face The false resemblaunce of Deceipt, I wist Did closely lurke; yet so true-seeming grace It carried, that I scarse in darksome place Could it discerne, though I the mother bee Of falshood, and roote of Duessaes race. O welcome child, whom I have longd to see, And now have seene unwares. Lo now I goe with thee.”

28

Then to her yron wagon she betakes, And with her beares the fowle welfavourd2 witch: Through mirkesome3 aire her ready way she makes. Her twyfold Teme, of which two blacke as pitch, And two were browne, yet each to each unlich,4 Did softly swim away, ne ever stamp, Unlesse she chaunst their stubborne mouths to twitch; Then foming tarre,5 their bridles they would champ, And trampling the fine element,6 would fiercely ramp.

29

So well they sped, that they be come at length Unto the place, whereas the Paynim lay, Devoid of outward sence, and native strength, Coverd with charmed cloud from vew of day, And sight of men, since his late luckelesse fray.

1

price, that he hath spilt: pay the price for blood that he has spilled. 2 fowle welfavourd: ugly-beautiful, an oxymoron; she is beautiful on the outside and ugly on the inside.

3

77

mirkesome: murky. unlich: unlike. 5 foming tarre: these horses were so sinister that even their saliva was black. 6 fine element: air. 4

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His cruell wounds with cruddy1 bloud congeald, They binden up so wisely, as they may, And handle softly, till they can be heald: So lay him in her charett,2 close in night conceald. 30

And all the while she stood upon the ground, The wakefull dogs did never cease to bay, As giving warning of th’unwonted sound, With which her yron wheeles did them affray, And her darke griesly looke them much dismay; The messenger of death, the ghastly owle With drery shrickes did also her bewray;3 And hungry wolves continually did howle, At her abhorred face, so filthy and so fowle.

31

Thence turning backe in silence softe they stole, And brought the heavy corse with easy pace To yawning gulfe of deepe Avernus hole.4 By that same hole an entraunce darke and bace With smoake and sulphur hiding all the place, Descends to hell: there creature never past, That backe retourned without heavenly grace; But dreadfull Furies, which their chaines have brast,5 And damned sprights sent forth to make ill6 men aghast.

32

By that same way the direfull dames doe drive Their mournefull charett, fild with rusty blood,7 And downe to Plutoes house are come bilive:8 Which passing through, on every side them stood The trembling ghosts with sad amazed mood, Chattring their iron teeth, and staring wide

1

cruddy: clotted. charett: chariot, cart. 3 bewray: manifest the presence of. 4 Avernus is a lake near Naples, but is traditionally pictured as a cavelike entrance to Hades, used by Aeneas (Aeneid, 6.237–63). There are many echoes of Aeneid, Book Six, in this episode. It seems as if challenging Virgil may have been Spenser’s motive for creating it, for it has no effect on the plot. 2

5

Furies: spirits who inspire vengeance, see note to iii.36; brast: burst. 6 ill: a common Elizabethan contraction of evil. 7 rusty blood: old, dried blood. On the phrase in iv.35.4, ACH notes, “usually the word suggests ‘filthy’ or ‘defiled’ from use, not disuse.” 8 bilive: quickly.

Canto Five

79

With stony eies; and all the hellish brood Of feends infernall flockt on every side, To gaze on erthly wight, that with the Night durst ride. 33

They pas the bitter waves of Acheron, Where many soules sit wailing woefully, And come to fiery flood of Phlegeton,1 Whereas the damned ghosts in torments fry, And with sharp shrilling shriekes doe bootlesse cry, Cursing high Jove, the which them thither sent. The house of endlesse paine is built thereby, In which ten thousand sorts of punishment The cursed creatures doe eternally torment.

34

Before the threshold dreadfull Cerberus2 His three deformed heads did lay along,3 Curled with thousand adders venemous, And lilled4 forth his bloody flaming tong: At them he gan to reare his bristles strong, And felly gnarre,5 untill Dayes enemy Did him appease; then downe his taile he hong And suffered them to passen quietly: For she in hell and heaven had power equally.

35

There was Ixion turned on a wheele,6 For daring tempt the Queene of heaven to sin; And Sisyphus an huge round stone did reele7 Against an hill, ne might from labour lin;8 There thristy Tantalus hong by the chin;9

1

Acheron and Phlegeton are rivers of Hell. Phlegeton is a river of fire. 2 The three-headed dog that guards the gate to Hell. 3 did lay along: stretched out on the ground. 4 lilled: lolled, two syllables. 5 felly gnarre: snarl viciously. 6 This catalogue of sufferers in hell, of which Virgil and the literature of the Middle Ages and Renaissance offer many examples, follows the list in Comes’ Mythologia (6.16) in order and wording, as Lotspeich has noted (74). These men and

deities all sought what cannot be obtained from the gods (6.16–22). Spenser adds to this list Theseus from Comes’ list of illustrious men (7.9), and the fifty sisters (9.17). “Three are guilty of sexual assault against goddesses, three of scorning or rebelling against the gods, and the fifty sisters of slaying their husbands” (ACH); for further details, see TPR and ACH. 7 reele: roll. 8 lin: cease. 9 hong by the chin: suspended up to the chin in water (ACH); a daring visualization of Tantalus’ standard punishment of being always about to drink but unable to do so.

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And Tityus fed a vultur on his maw; Typhoeus joynts were stretched on a gin,1 Theseus condemned to endlesse slouth2 by law And fifty sisters water in leke3 vessels draw. 36

They all beholding worldly wights in place,4 Leave off their worke, unmindfull of their smart, To gaze on them; who forth by them do pace, Till they be come unto the furthest part: Where was a Cave ywrought by wondrous art, Deepe, darke, uneasy, dolefull, comfortlesse, In which sad Aesculapius far apart Emprisond was in chaines remedilesse, For that Hippolytus rent corse he did redresse.5

37

Hippolytus a jolly huntsman was, That wont in charett chace the foming bore; He all his Peeres in beauty did surpas, But Ladies love as losse of time forbore: His wanton stepdame6 loved him the more, But when she saw her offred sweets refusd Her love she turnd to hate, and him before His father fierce of treason false accusd, And with her gealous termes his open eares abusd.7

38

Who all in rage his Sea-god syre besought,8 Some cursed vengeaunce on his sonne to cast: From surging gulf two Monsters streight were brought,

1

gin: engine; in this case, a rack. Lotspeich finds no source for this punishment, but TPR points out that this is traditionally the punishment of Tityus, above, which Spenser has transferred to Typhoeus. 2 endlesse slouth: endless sloth, sitting in a chair for eternity. 3 leke: leaky. 4 in place: in that place. 5 Hippolytus was dragged to death as a result of the passion and deceit of his stepmother Phaedra (Aeneid, 7.761ff). Virgil says Apollo and Diana reassembled him into a new man called Virbius. Spenser got the

notion that Aesculapius, a god of medicine, restored Hippolytus from Metamorphoses (15.497ff) and Boccacio, De Genealogia Deorum (10.50). See M&P. 6 I.e., Phaedra. 7 I.e., she convinced the gullible father Theseus that Hippolytus had tried to seduce her, thus arousing his jealousy. 8 Theseus, in a rage, prayed to his father, the sea god Neptune, who sent two sea monsters to frighten the horses that drew Hippolytus’ chariot and so cause an accident, dragging their master to death.

Canto Five

81

With dread whereof his chacing steedes aghast, Both charett swifte and huntsman overcast. His goodly corps on ragged cliffs yrent,1 Was quite dismembred, and his members chast Scattered on every mountaine, as he went, That of Hippolytus was lefte no moniment.2 39

His cruell stepdame seeing what was donne, Her wicked daies with wretched knife did end, In death avowing th’innocence of her sonne. Which hearing his rash Syre, began to rend His heare,3 and hasty tong, that did offend: Tho gathering up the relicks of his smart4 By Dianes meanes, who was Hippolyts frend, Them brought to Aesculape, that by his art Did heale them all againe, and joyned every part.

40

Such wondrous science in mans witt to rain5 When Jove avizd, that could the dead revive, And fates expired could renew again,6 Of endlesse life he might him not deprive, But unto hell did thrust him downe alive, With flashing thunderbolt ywounded sore: Where long remaining, he did alwaies strive Him selfe with salves to health for to restore, And slake the heavenly fire, that raged evermore.

41

There auncient Night arriving, did alight From her nigh weary wayne,7 and in her armes To Æsculapius brought the wounded knight: Whome having softly disaraid of armes, Tho gan to him discover all his harmes, Beseeching him with prayer, and with praise,

1

yrent: torn. moniment: monument or identifiable remains. But there must have been something left because the remains are gathered in the next lines. 3 heare: hair. 2

4

I.e., the remains of Hippolytus. rain: reign. 6 I.e., could literally give a person a new lease on life, after his destined time on earth had expired. 7 wayne: cart; variant spelling of “wain,” as in iv.9.2 and iv.19.7. 5

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If either salves, or oyles, or herbes, or charmes A fordonne1 wight from dore of death mote raise, He would at her request prolong her nephews daies. 42

“Ah Dame” (quoth he) “thou temptest me in vaine, To dare the thing, which daily yet I rew, And the old cause of my continued paine With like attempt to like end to renew. Is not enough, that thrust from heaven dew Here endlesse penaunce for one fault I pay, But that redoubled crime with vengeance new Thou biddest me to eeke? Can Night defray2 The wrath of thundring Jove, that rules both night and day?”

43

“Not so” (quoth she) “but sith that heavens king From hope of heaven hath thee excluded quight, Why fearest thou, that canst not hope for thing, And fearest not, that more thee hurten might, Now in the powre of everlasting Night? Goe to then, O thou far renouned sonne Of great Apollo, shew thy famous might In medicine, that els3 hath to thee wonne Great pains, and greater praise, both never to be donne.”4

44

Her words prevaild: And then the learned leach5 His cunning hand gan to his wounds to lay, And all things els, the which his art did teach: Which having seene, from thence arose away The mother of dredd darkenesse, and let stay Aveugles sonne there in the leaches cure,6 And backe retourning tooke her wonted way, To ronne her timely race, whilst Phoebus pure In westerne waves his weary wagon did recure.7

1

fordonne: ruined, exhausted, “done in.” eeke: augment; defray: discharge a debt by paying; “buy off.” 3 els: already. 4 donne: finished. 5 leach: doctor. 2

6

We never hear any more about Sansjoy in the poem as we have it. But at the beginning of Canto Six, we learn that Redcrosse is “yet half sad,” just as in i.2 his “cheer,” his outward behavior, was “too solemne sad.” It is as if a piece of Sansjoy is embedded in Redcrosse; perhaps that is what makes it impossible for Redcrosse to kill him. 7 recure: refresh.

Canto Five

45

The false Duessa leaving noyous1 Night, Returnd to stately pallace of Dame Pryde; Where when she came, she found the Faery knight Departed thence, albee2 his woundes wyde Not throughly heald, unready were to ryde. Good cause he had to hasten thence away; For on a day his wary Dwarfe had spyde, Where in a dungeon deepe huge nombers lay Of caytive3 wretched thralls, that wayled night and day.

46

A ruefull sight, as could be seene with eie; Of whom he learned had in secret wise The hidden cause of their captivitie, How mortgaging their lives to Covetise, Through wastfull Pride, and wanton Riotise,4 They were by law of that proud Tyrannesse Provokt with Wrath, and Envyes false surmise, Condemned to that Dongeon mercilesse, Where they should live in wo, and dye in wretchednesse.

47

There was that great proud king of Babylon,5 That would compell all nations to adore, And him as onely God to call upon, Till through celestiall doome6 thrown out of dore, Into an Oxe he was transformd of yore: There also was king Croesus, that enhaunst

1

noyous: harmful. albee: albeit, although. 3 caytive: here, captive. 4 Riotise: riotous behavior, like that of Lechery in iv.20.5. 5 Nebuchadnezzar (Dan. 3–6). In the Bible, he only becomes like a beast; he does not actually become an ox; see esp. Dan. 4.30. Spenser may have found this further indignity in Gower’s Confessio amantis, I.2972–3. The following list of victims, like the helldwellers they resemble, is also traditional: those listed come mostly either from Plutarch, Lives of the Noble Grecians and 2

83

Romans; or from Chaucer’s “Monk’s Tale” and its source, Boccaccio’s De Casibus Virorum Illustrium, which last two contributed Nebuchadnezzar, Croesus, and Antiochus (stanza 47), Alexander (48), Julius Caesar and his opponent Pompey (49), and Sthenobia or Cenobia (50). Spenser, unlike other authors, sees all their bad ends as punishments for their sins, esp. pride (ACH; M&P); though it is hard to see how Scipio, usually much admired, deserves this charge, T. Cooper accuses Scipio not of pride, but only of trusting fortune and the voice of the people. 6 celestiall doome: God’s judgment.

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His hart too high through his great richesse store;1 And proud Antiochus, the which advaunst His cursed hand gainst God, and on his altares daunst.2 48

And them long time before, great Nimrod was, That first the world with sword and fire warrayd;3 And after him old Ninus far did pas In princely pomp, of all the world obayd;4 There also was that mightie Monarch5 layd Low under all, yet above all in pride, That name of native syre did fowle upbrayd, And would as Ammons sonne be magnifide, Till scornd of God and man a shamefull death he dide.

49

All these together in one heape were throwne, Like carkases of beastes in butchers stall. And in another corner wide were strowne The Antique ruins of the Romanes fall: Great Romulus the Grandsyre of them all, Proud Tarquin, and too lordly Lentulus, Stout Scipio, and stubborne Hanniball, Ambitious Sylla, and sterne Marius, High Caesar, great Pompey, and fiers Antonius.6

1

Croesus is proverbial for wealth. Spenser mixes Biblical with classical figures. 2 Antiochus is the king of Syria who desecrated the temple at Jerusalem in some manner (1 Macc. 1.20–25; 2 Macc. 6.4–5). 3 warrayd: made war on. Nimrod was a “mighty hunter,” which phrase the Geneva Bible glossed as “a cruel oppressour and tyrant” (Gloss e); one of his kingdoms was Babel, see Genesis 10.8–10 on which the Geneva gloss says “his tyrannie came into a proverbe.” Always eager to denigrate “Nimrod and his companie” (Gloss b), this Bible comments on Gen. 11.4 that it was he who built the tower thereof, and that he was “moved with pride and ambition” (Gloss e). Genesis does not name the individuals who built the tower. 4 Ninus founded Nineveh, a wicked city, in Jon. 1.1. T. Cooper’s Thesaurus claims “he

was the first that made warre.” In II.ix 21.5–6 and 56.8, Spenser has Ninus, not Nimrod, as the one who built the Tower of Babel. 5 Alexander the Great, who, scorning his own father, claimed to be the son of Jupiter Ammon (ACH). After this, T. Cooper says “he fell into such crueltie and pryde . . . that he became odious to his owne people . . . [and] was poisoned.” 6 “These men would be well known to any Elizabethan schoolboy. Most of the material is in T. Cooper and Plutarch” (ACH). All of them from Stanza 48 though 50 are in T. Cooper except the biblical examples Nimrod and Nebuchadnezzar. Lines 7 through 9 are organized in terms of enemies: Hannibal versus Scipio, Marius versus Sylla (or Sulla), and Caesar versus Pompey versus Antonius.

Canto Five

50

Amongst these mightie men were wemen mixt, Proud wemen, vaine, forgetfull of their yoke:1 The bold Semiramis, whose sides transfixt With sonnes own blade, her fowle reproches spoke;2 Fayre Sthenoboea, that her selfe did choke With wilfull chord, for wanting of her will;3 High minded Cleopatra, that with stroke Of Aspes sting her selfe did stoutly kill:4 And thousands moe the like, that did that dongeon fill.

51

Besides the endlesse routes5 of wretched thralles, Which thether were assembled day by day, From all the world after their wofull falles, Through wicked pride, and wasted welthes decay. But most of all, which in the Dongeon lay Fell from high Princes courtes, or Ladies bowres, Where they in ydle pomp, or wanton play, Consumed had their goods, and thriftlesse howres, And lastly thrown themselves into these heavy stowres.6

52

Whose case whenas the carefull Dwarfe had tould,7 And made ensample of their mournfull sight Unto his maister, he no lenger would There dwell in perill of like painefull plight,

1

I.e., forgetful that they should remain subordinate to men—presumably that desiring rule was itself a sin of pride on their part, though by no means their only sin. The catalogue of women is from T. Cooper’s Thesaurus and from Boccaccio, De claris mulieribus. 2 Semiramis, the wife of Ninus, was most valiant and ruled well after her husband’s death. Her honor was destroyed by her lasciviousness. She seduced her son, who later killed her (TPR). 3 will: sexual desire. Sthenoboea loved a younger man, Bellerophon—not her husband Proetus, a king of Argos. When Bellerophon turned her down and then married someone else, she despaired and killed herself (M&P).

85

4 Cleopatra, the queen of Egypt, and Mark Antony were lovers; she killed herself after Mark Antony’s death, so that she would not be captured and made a public spectacle by her conqueror Julius Caesar. 5 routes: crowds. Just what distinguishes the “murdred men” outside, other than their anonymity, from Pride’s victims inside and the spirits in Hades is not clear. Pride’s victims inside seem to be living a kind of half life, and the spirits in Hell are of course eternal. 6 stowres: afflictions. 7 The Dwarf ’s report is further evidence that he symbolizes or exemplifies worldly prudence.

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But earely rose, and ere that dawning light Discovered had the world to heaven wyde, He by a privy Posterne1 tooke his flight, That of no envious eyes he mote be spyde: For doubtlesse death ensewed, if any him descryde. 53

1

Scarse could he footing find in that fowle way, For many corses, like a great Lay-stall2 Of murdred men which therein strowed3 lay, Without remorse, or decent funerall: Which al through that great Princesse pride did fall And came to shamefull end. And them besyde Forth ryding underneath the castell wall, A Donghill of dead carcases he spyde, The dreadfull spectacle of that sad house of Pryde.

Posterne: the usually inconspicuous back gate of a castle. 2 Lay-stall: heap of trash or dung.

3

strowed: strewn, cast at random.

Canto Six From lawlesse lust by wondrous grace fayre Una is releast: Whom salvage nation does adore, and learnes her wise beheast.

1

As when a ship, that flyes fayre under sayle, An hidden rocke escaped hath unwares, That lay in waite her wrack for to bewaile,1 The Marriner yet halfe amazed stares At perill past, and yet in doubt ne dares To joy at his foolhappie oversight: So doubly is distrest twixt joy and cares The dreadlesse corage of this Elfin knight, Having escapt so sad ensamples in his sight.

2

Yet sad he was, that his too hastie speed The fayre Duess’ had forst him leave behind; And yet more sad, that Una his deare dreed2 Her truth had staynd with treason so unkind;3 Yet cryme in her could never creature find, But for his love, and for her owne selfe sake, She wandred had from one to other Ynd,4 Him for to seeke, ne ever would forsake, Till her unwares the fiers Sansloy did overtake.

3

Who after Archimagoes fowle defeat, Led her away into a forest wilde, And turning wrathfull fyre to lustfull heat, With beastly sin thought her to have defilde, And made the vassall of his pleasures vilde.

1

3

Since a rock, even a personified one, is unlikely to bewail the shipwreck it has caused, this represents a forced usage or error by Spenser (OED, 3b). 2 deare dreed: object both of love and of awe or reverence. OED cites this line.

unkind: both in its modern sense and in its older sense of unnatural. 4 from one to other Ynd: from the East Indies to the West Indies—a rhetorical exaggeration, since no mention is made of a ship.

87

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Yet first he cast by treatie, and by traynes,1 Her to persuade, that stubborne fort to yilde: For greater conquest of hard love he gaynes, That workes it to his will, then he that it constraines. 4

With fawning wordes he courted her a while, And looking lovely, and oft sighing sore, Her constant hart did tempt with diverse guile: But wordes, and lookes, and sighes she did abhore, As rock of Diamond stedfast evermore. Yet for to feed his fyrie lustfull eye, He snatcht the vele, that hong her face before; Then gan her beautie shyne, as brightest skye, And burnt his beastly hart t’efforce her chastitye.2

5

So when he saw his flatt’ring artes to fayle, And subtile engines bett from batteree,3 With greedy force he gan the fort assayle, Whereof he weend possessed soone to bee, And win rich spoile of ransackt chastitee. Ah heavens, that doe this hideous act behold, And heavenly virgin thus outraged see, How can ye vengeance just so long withhold, And hurle not flashing flames vpon that Paynim bold?

6

The pitteous mayden carefull4 comfortlesse, Does throw out thrilling shriekes, and shrieking cryes, The last vaine helpe of wemens great distresse, And with loud plaintes importuneth the skyes, That molten starres doe drop like weeping eyes; And Phoebus flying so most shamefull sight, His blushing face in foggy cloud implyes,5 And hydes for shame. What witt of mortall wight Can now devise to quitt a thrall6 from such a plight?

1 by treatie, and by traynes: by pleading and by trickery. 2 t’efforce her chastitye: to take her virginity by force. 3 engines bett from batteree: war devices beaten down from their assault.

Spenser uses imagery of battle to describe the sexual contest (TPR). 4 carefull: full of worry. 5 implyes: enfolds. 6 thrall: captive.

Canto Six

7

Eternall providence exceeding thought, Where none appeares can make her selfe a way: A wondrous way it for this Lady wrought, From Lyons clawes to pluck the gryped pray. Her shrill outcryes and shrieks so loud did bray, That all the woodes and forestes did resownd; A troupe of Faunes and Satyres1 far a way Within the wood were dauncing in a rownd, Whiles old Sylvanus2 slept in shady arber sownd.

8

Who when they heard that pitteous strained voice, In haste forsooke their rurall meriment, And ran towardes the far rebownded noyce, To weet, what wight so loudly did lament. Unto the place they come incontinent:3 Whom when the raging Sarazin espyde, A rude, mishappen, monstrous rablement, Whose like he never saw, he durst not byde, But got his ready steed, and fast away gan ryde.

9

The wyld woodgods arrived in the place, There find the virgin doolfull desolate, With ruffled rayments, and fayre blubbred4 face, As her outrageous foe had left her late, And trembling yet through feare of former hate; All stand amazed at so uncouth sight, And gin to pittie her unhappie state, All stand astonied5 at her beautie bright, In their rude eyes unworthy of so wofull plight.

10

She more amazd, in double dread doth dwell; And every tender part for feare does shake: As when a greedy Wolfe through honger fell6 A seely7 Lamb far from the flock does take, Of whom he meanes his bloody feast to make, A Lyon spyes fast running towards him,

1

Deities of the forest, human from the waist up and goat from the waist down. 2 God of fauns and satyrs. Spenser’s son by his first wife was named Sylvanus. 3 incontinent: at once.

4

89

blubbred: swollen from weeping. astonied: stunned. 6 fell: ruthless. 7 seely: innocent, synonymous with “silly” in its old sense of innocent. 5

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The innocent pray in hast he does forsake, Which quitt1 from death yet quakes in every lim With chaunge of feare, to see the Lyon looke so grim. 11

Such fearefull fitt assaid her trembling hart, Ne word to speake, ne joynt to move she had: The salvage2 nation feele her secret smart, And read her sorrow in her count’nance sad; Their frowning forheades with rough hornes yclad, And rustick horror3 all a syde doe lay, And gently grenning,4 shew a semblance glad To comfort her, and feare to put away, Their backward bent knees teach her humbly to obay.5

12

The doubtfull Damzell dare not yet committ, Her single person to their barbarous truth,6 But still twixt feare and hope amazd does sitt, Late learnd what harme to hasty trust ensu’th,7 They in compassion of her tender youth, And wonder of her beautie soverayne, Are wonne with pitty and unwonted ruth,8 And all prostrate upon the lowly playne, Doe kisse her feete, and fawne on her with count’nance fayne.9

13

Their harts she ghesseth by their humble guise,10 And yieldes her to extremitie of time; So from the ground she fearelesse doth arise,

1

quitt: here, released, usually with the overtone of “bought” or “redeemed.” 2 salvage: savage, Spenser’s usual spelling. The word and concept are very important in this canto and in Book Six. Not necessarily derogatory; could be neutrally anthropological, as here. Sylvanus’ attempt to identify Una with one of the classical deities represents an exercise in natural religion; it is more successful than that of the Satyrs he governs, but still not correct. 3 horror: here roughness, hairiness. Presumably they shave, comb, or slick down their hair. 4 grenning: grinning. 5 The grammatical subject of this clause is

they or all, referring back to “the salvage nation.” “They teach their knees (bent backward like those of a goat) to kneel in humble obedience to her” (M&P). Word order is mixed up in order to arrange six strong and consonant-clogged syllables in a row, dramatizing 1) how difficult it is for an animal’s back legs to kneel, and 2) the difficulty one experiences in learning and practicing Christian doctrine. 6 single: solitary; truth: honesty. 7 I.e., recently taught what harm comes from trusting someone too hastily. 8 unwonted ruth: unaccustomed pity. 9 fayne: happy, cheerful. 10 guise: behavior.

Canto Six

91

And walketh forth without suspect of crime: They all as glad, as birdes of joyous Pryme,1 Thence lead her forth, about her dauncing round, Shouting, and singing all a shepheards ryme, And with greene braunches strowing all the ground, Do worship her, as Queene, with olive girlond cround. 14

And all the way their merry pipes they sound, That all the woods with doubled Eccho ring, And with their horned feet doe weare the ground, Leaping like wanton kids in pleasant Spring. So towards old Sylvanus they her bring; Who with the noyse awaked, commeth out, To weet the cause, his weake steps governing, And aged limbs on Cypresse stadle2 stout, And with an yvie twyne his waste is girt about.

15

Far off he wonders, what them makes so glad, Or Bacchus merry fruit they did invent,3 Or Cybeles franticke rites have made them mad;4 They drawing nigh, unto their God present That flowre of fayth and beautie excellent: The God himselfe vewing that mirrhour rare,5 Stood long amazd, and burnt in his intent;6 His owne fayre Dryope now he thinkes not faire, And Pholoe fowle, when her to this he doth compaire.7

16

The woodborne people fall before her flat, And worship her as Goddesse of the wood; And old Sylvanus selfe bethinkes not, what To thinke of wight so fayre, but gazing stood, In doubt to deeme her borne of earthly brood;

1

Pryme: early morning or springtime. stadle: staff. 3 I.e., whether they had found some wine. Spenser often uses “or . . . or” where we would use “whether . . . or”; see II.ii.4. 4 The priests of Cybele celebrated her rites with wild dances and music (TPR). 5 mirrhour rare: mirror of God, goodness, and beauty, as in Proem 5.2 of Queen 2

Elizabeth: “mirrour of grace and majesty divine”—ultimately a Platonic notion. 6 burnt in his intent: not, as it turns out, in lust for her, but in intense gaze or observation. 7 Dryope and Pholoe were wives of other sylvan gods whom Spenser may have conflated with Sylvanus. “The pun (‘Pholoe fowle’) may be what attracted Spenser to the latter” (TPR).

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Sometimes Dame Venus selfe he seemes to see, But Venus never had so sober mood; Sometimes Diana he her takes to be, But misseth bow, and shaftes, and buskins1 to her knee. 17

By vew of her he ginneth to revive His ancient love, and dearest Cyparisse,2 And calles to mind his pourtraiture alive,3 How fayre he was, and yet not fayre to this, And how he slew with glauncing dart amisse A gentle Hynd, the which the lovely boy Did love as life, above all worldly blisse; For griefe whereof the lad n’ould after joy,4 But pynd away in anguish and selfewild annoy.5

18

The wooddy Nymphes, fayre Hamadryades6 Her to behold do thether runne apace, And all the troupe of light-foot Naiades,7 Flocke all about to see her lovely face: But when they vewed have her heavenly grace, They envy her in their malitious mind, And fly away for feare of fowle disgrace: But all the Satyres scorne their woody kind,8 And henceforth nothing faire, but her on earth they find.

19

Glad of such lucke, the luckelesse lucky mayd,9 Did her content to please their feeble eyes, And long time with that salvage people stayd, To gather breath in many miseryes.

1 buskins: boots. Diana needs such equipment because she is goddess of the hunt. She resembles Una and contrasts with Venus in her chastity. 2 Because Sylvanus loved Cyparissus, he changed the lad into a cypress tree (Latin: cyparissus). Sylvanus ever after carried a cypress branch, which accounts for the “Cypresse stadle” of 14.8. Spenser follows Natalis Comes, Mythologia, 5.10; and Boccaccio, Genealogia Deorum, 13.17. In Metamorphoses (10.106ff), it was Apollo who loved the lad (TPR; M&P).

3

I.e., his appearance when alive. n’ould after joy: the lad took no joy in anything thereafter. 5 selfewild annoy: self-imposed suffering. 6 Hamadryades: nymphs of individual trees. 7 Naiades: nymphs of rivers or springs. 8 woody kind: generally, inhabitants of the forest; esp. potential mates of the Satyrs’ own species, or from among the nymphs. 9 Oxymoron. 4

Canto Six

93

During which time her gentle wit she plyes, To teach them truth, which worshipt her in vaine, And made her th’Image of Idolatryes; But when their bootlesse1 zeale she did restrayne From her own worship, they her Asse would worship fayn. 20

It fortuned a noble warlike knight By just occasion to that forrest came, To seeke his kindred, and the lignage right, From whence he tooke his weldeserved name: He had in armes abroad wonne muchell fame, And fild far landes with glorie of his might, Plaine, faithfull, true, and enimy of shame, And ever lov’d to fight for Ladies right, But in vaine glorious frayes he litle did delight.

21

A Satyres sonne yborne in forrest wyld, By straunge adventure as it did betyde, And there begotten of a Lady myld, Fayre Thyamis the daughter of Labryde,2 That was in sacred bandes of wedlocke tyde To Therion,3 a loose unruly swayne; Who had more joy to raunge the forrest wyde, And chase the salvage beast with busie payne,4 Then serve his Ladies love, and waste in pleasures vayne.

22

The forlorne mayd5 did with loves longing burne, And could not lacke her lovers company, But to the wood she goes, to serve her turne, And seeke her spouse, that from her still does fly, And followes other game and venery:6 A Satyre chaunst her wandring for to finde, And kindling coles of lust in brutish eye, The loyall linkes of wedlocke did unbinde, And made her person thrall unto his beastly kind.

1

bootlesse: useless because wrongly directed. 2 Thyamis: Greek for “passion”; Labryde: Greek for “turbulent,” “greedy.” 3 Therion: Greek for “wild beast.”

4

busie payne: careful industry. mayd: i.e., Thyamis. Spenser is digressing into Satyrane’s biography. 6 venery: hunting; with a pun on venery as the works of Venus, sexual activity. 5

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23

So long in secret cabin there he held Her captive to his sensuall desyre, Till that with timely fruit her belly sweld, And bore a boy unto that salvage syre: Then home he suffred her for to retyre, For ransome leaving him the late-borne childe; Whom till to ryper yeares he gan aspyre,1 He noursled up2 in life and manners wilde, Emongst wild beastes and woods, from lawes of men exilde.

24

For all he taught the tender ymp3 was but To banish cowardize and bastard feare; His trembling hand he would him force to put Upon the Lyon and the rugged Beare, And from the she Beares teats her whelps to teare; And eke wyld roring Buls he would him make To tame, and ryde their backes not made to beare; And the Robuckes in flight to overtake, That everie beast for feare of him did fly and quake.

25

Thereby so fearelesse, and so fell he grew, That his owne syre and maister of his guise Did often tremble at his horrid vew, And oft for dread of hurt would him advise, The angry beastes not rashly to despise, Nor too much to provoke: for he would learne4 The Lyon stoup to him in lowly wise, (A lesson hard) and make the Libbard5 sterne Leave roaring, when in rage he for revenge did earne.6

1

aspyre: here, grow up; usually used in its modern, emotional sense. 2 noursled up: reared; following the 1596 edition, frequent in Spenser. The 1590 variant “nousled” would be a Spenserian spelling of “nuzzled”—a word that Spenser applies only to moles. 3 ymp: child. As Upton was the first to notice (Var., 246), Satyrane’s education is like that of Achilles, who was taught by the

centaur Chiron; Spenser may have borrowed it from the education of Ruggiero, a major hero, by Atlantes (OF, 7.57). It is not certain what Satyrane symbolizes, but here he is clearly set above both the lion and the satyrs by his understanding of Christianity and the fact that he is three-fourths human. 4 learne: teach. 5 Libbard: leopard. 6 earne: yearn.

Canto Six

26

And for to make his powre approved more,1 Wyld beastes in yron yokes he would compell; The spotted Panther, and the tuskéd Bore, The Pardale2 swift, and the Tigre cruell; The Antelope, and Wolfe both fiers and fell; And them constraine in equall teme to draw.3 Such joy he had, their stubborne harts to quell, And sturdie courage tame with dreadfull aw, That his beheast they feared, as a tyrans law.

27

His loving mother came upon a day Unto the woodes, to see her little sonne; And chaunst unwares to meet him in the way, After his sportes, and cruell pastime donne, When after him a Lyonesse did runne, That roaring all with rage, did lowd requere4 Her children deare, whom he away had wonne: The Lyon whelpes she saw how he did beare, And lull in rugged armes, withouten childish feare.

28

The fearefull Dame all quaked at the sight, And turning backe, gan fast to fly away, Untill with love revokt5 from vaine affright, She hardly yet perswaded was to stay, And then to him these womanish words gan say; “Ah Satyrane, my dearling, and my joy, For love of me leave off this dreadfull play; To dally thus with death, is no fit toy, Go find some other play-fellowes, mine own sweet boy.”

29

In these and like delightes of bloody game He trayned was, till ryper yeares he raught,6 And there abode, whylst any beast of name Walkt in that forrest, whom he had not taught, To feare his force: and then his courage haught7 Desyrd of forreine foemen to be knowne,

1

4

2

5

I.e., to prove his power the more. Pardale: panther or leopard. 3 equall teme to draw: to pull together; the direct object, telling what they pulled, is left unstated.

95

requere: variant spelling of “require.” revokt: called back (Latin: revocatus). 6 raught: variant form of “reached.” 7 haught: haughty.

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And far abroad for straunge adventures sought: In which his might was never overthrowne, But through al Faery lond his famous worth was blown. 30

Yet evermore it was his maner faire, After long labours and adventures spent, Unto those native woods for to repaire,1 To see his syre and ofspring2 auncient. And now he thether came for like intent; Where he unwares the fairest Una found, Straunge Lady, in so straunge habiliment,3 Teaching the Satyres, which her sat around Trew sacred lore, which from her sweet lips did redound.

31

He wondred at her wisedome hevenly rare, Whose like in womens witt he never knew; And when her curteous deeds he did compare, Gan her admire, and her sad sorrowes rew, Blaming of Fortune, which such troubles threw, And joyd to make proofe of her cruelty On gentle Dame, so hurtlesse,4 and so trew: Thenceforth he kept her goodly company, And learnd her discipline of faith and verity.

32

But she all vowd unto the Redcrosse knight, His wandring perill closely5 did lament, Ne in this new acquaintaunce could delight, But her deare heart with anguish did torment, And all her witt in secret counsels spent, How to escape. At last in privy wise To Satyrane she shewed her intent; Who glad to gain such favour, gan devise, How with that pensive Maid he best might thence arise.6

33

So on a day when Satyres all were gone, To doe their service to Sylvanus old, The gentle virgin left behinde alone

1

repaire: come or go; sometimes also used in the modern sense. 2 ofspring: origin; see 20.3. 3 habiliment: attire.

4

hurtlesse: harmless. closely: secretly. 6 arise: depart. 5

Canto Six

He led away with corage stout and bold. Too late it was, to Satyres to be told, Or ever hope recover her againe: In vaine he seekes that having cannot hold. So fast he carried her with carefull paine, That they the woods are past, and come now to the plaine. 34

The better part now of the lingring day, They traveild had, whenas they far espide A weary wight forwandring1 by the way, And towards him they gan in hast to ride, To weete of newes, that did abroad betide, Or tidings of her knight of the Redcrosse. But he them spying, gan to turne aside, For feare as seemd, or for some feigned losse; More greedy they of newes, fast towards him do crosse.

35

A silly2 man, in simple weeds forworne, And soild with dust of the long dried way; His sandales were with toilsome travell torne, And face all tand with scorching sunny ray, As he had traveild many a sommers day, Through boyling sands of Arabie and Ynde; And in his hand a Jacobs staffe,3 to stay His weary limbs upon: and eke behind, His scrip4 did hang, in which his needments he did bind.

36

The knight approching nigh, of him inquerd Tidings of warre, and of adventures new; But warres, nor new adventures none he herd. Then Una gan to aske, if ought he knew, Or heard abroad of that her champion trew, That in his armour bare a croslet5 red. “Ay me, Deare dame” (quoth he) “well may I rew To tell the sad sight, which mine eies have red: These eies did see that knight both living, and eke ded.”

1

forwandring: wandering far and wide, as if he had been wandering too long.

3

Jacobs staffe: pilgrim’s staff.

4

2

5

scrip: pilgrim’s bag. croslet: little cross.

silly: simple, unsophisticated.

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37

That cruell word her tender hart so thrild,1 That suddein cold did ronne through every vaine, And stony horrour all her sences fild With dying fitt, that downe she fell for paine. The knight her lightly reared up againe, And comforted with curteous kind reliefe: Then wonne from death, she bad him tellen plaine The further processe2 of her hidden griefe; The lesser pangs can beare, who hath endur’d the chief.3

38

Then gan the Pilgrim thus, “I chaunst this day, This fatall day, that shall I ever rew, To see two knights in travell on my way (A sory sight) arraung’d in batteill new, Both breathing vengeaunce, both of wrathfull hew: My feareful flesh did tremble at their strife, To see their blades so greedily imbrew,4 That dronke with blood, yet thristed after life: What more? the Redcrosse knight was slain with Paynim knife.”

39

“Ah dearest Lord” (quoth she) “how might that bee, And he the stoutest knight, that ever wonne?”5 “Ah dearest dame” (quoth hee) “how might I see The thing, that might not be, and yet was donne?” “Where is” (said Satyrane) “that Paynims sonne, That him of life, and us of joy hath refte?”6 “Not far away” (quoth he) “he hence doth wonne7 Foreby a fountaine, where I late him lefte Washing his bloody wounds, that through the steele were cleft.”

40

Therewith the knight thence marched forth in hast, Whiles Una with huge heavinesse opprest, Could not for sorrow follow him so fast; And soone he came, as he the place had ghest, Whereas that Pagan proud him selfe did rest,

1

4

2

5

thrild: pierced. processe: account. 3 I.e., he who has endured the chief pang can bear the lesser ones. Una expresses the same courage in her reaction to the next “revelation” of Redcrosse’s death (vii.25.5).

imbrew: soak themselves in blood. wonne: engaged in battle (M&P). 6 refte: bereaved, violently deprived; past tense of “reave.” 7 wonne: remain.

Canto Six

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In secret shadow by a fountaine side: Even he it was, that earst would have supprest1 Faire Una: whom when Satyrane espide, With foule reprochfull words he boldly him defide. 41

And said, “Arise thou cursed Miscreaunt, That hast with knightlesse guile and trecherous train2 Faire knighthood fowly shamed, and doest vaunt That good knight of the Redcrosse to have slain: Arise, and with like treason now maintain Thy guilty wrong, or els thee guilty yield.” The Sarazin this hearing, rose amain,3 And catching up in hast his three square4 shield, And shining helmet, soone him buckled to the field.

42

And drawing nigh him said, “Ah misborn Elfe, In evill houre thy foes thee hither sent, Anothers wrongs to wreak upon thy selfe:5 Yet ill thou blamest me, for having blent6 My name with guile and traiterous intent; That Redcrosse knight, perdie, I never slew, But had he beene, where earst his armes were lent, Th’enchaunter vaine his errour should not rew:7 But thou his errour shalt, I hope now proven trew.”8

43

Therewith they gan, both furious and fell,9 To thunder blowes, and fiersly to assaile Each other, bent his enimy to quell, That with their force they perst both plate and maile,

1

supprest: raped. knightlesse: unknightly, unworthy of a knight; train: deceit. 3 amain: at once. 4 three square: triangular. In Book Three, Glauce, a good if limited character, has a shield of similar shape. 5 I.e., “to draw upon yourself the consequences of another’s wrongs” (M&P). 6 blent: blemished. 7 I.e., had Redcrosse been inside of his armor instead of Archimago, Archimago 2

would not have been trounced as he was. Sansloy thinks that Archimago somehow acquired Redcrosse’s armor, but the armor was just one of Archimago’s illusions. 8 I.e., “your experience at my hands shall now, I hope, confirm Archimago’s foolishness in venturing to fight me” (M&P). Sansloy’s witticism is cryptic, which may be why Satyrane proceeds to fight him despite his clearly expressed innocence of the charge. 9 fell: ruthless.

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The Faerie Queene: Book One

And made wide furrowes in their fleshes fraile, That it would pitty any living eie.1 Large floods of blood adowne their sides did raile; But floods of blood could not them satisfie: Both hongred after death: both chose to win, or die. 44

So long they fight, and fell2 revenge pursue, That fainting each, themselves to breathen lett,3 And ofte refreshed, battell oft renue: As when two Bores with rancling malice mett, Their gory sides fresh bleeding fiercely frett, Til breathlesse both them selves aside retire, Where foming wrath, their cruell tuskes they whett, And trample th’earth, the whiles they may respire; Then backe to fight againe, new breathed and entire.4

45

So fiersly, when these knights had breathed once, They gan to fight retourne, increasing more Their puissant force, and cruell rage attonce, With heaped strokes more hugely, then before, That with their drery5 wounds and bloody gore They both deformed, scarsely could bee known. By this sad Una fraught with anguish sore, Led with their noise, which through the aire was thrown: Arriv’d, wher they in erth their fruitles blood had sown.

46

Whom all so soone as that proud Sarazin Espide, he gan revive the memory Of his leud lusts, and late attempted sin, And lefte the doubtfull6 battell hastily, To catch her, newly offred to his eie: But Satyrane with strokes him turning, staid, And sternely bad him other businesse plie, Then hunt the steps of pure unspotted Maid: Wherewith he al enrag’d, these bitter speaches said.

1 I.e., that it would move any living eye to pity. 2 fell: ruthless. 3 I.e., so that each one, feeling faint, lets himself take a breather.

4

entire: whole, intact. drery: here, gory; often in almost the modern sense, but more intense. 6 doubtfull: undecided. 5

Canto Six

47

“O foolish faeries sonne, what fury mad Hath thee incenst, to hast thy dolefull fate? Were it not better, I that Lady had, Then that thou hadst repented it too late? Most sencelesse man he, that himselfe doth hate, To love another. Lo then for thine ayd Here take thy lovers token on thy pate.” So they to fight; the whiles the royall Mayd Fledd farre away, of that proud Paynim sore afrayd.1

48

But that false Pilgrim, which that leasing2 told, Being in deed old Archimage, did stay In secret shadow, all this to behold, And much rejoyced in their bloody fray: But when he saw the Damsell passe away He left his stond,3 and her pursewd apace, In hope to bring her to her last decay.4 But for to tell her lamentable cace, And eke this battels end, will need another place.5

1

The situation recalls OF, 1.16–19, in which Rinaldo and Ferraù fight over Angelica while she slips away. 2 leasing: lie. 3 stond: stand, place of ambush (ACH). 4 Archimago catches up with Una only when she is reunited with Redcrosse and her family, and she exposes him (xii.24–36). In Book Two, we are told that he has given up on her and is seeking other victims such as Redcrosse (II.i.2).

5

101

We never hear the end of this battle, or whether Sansloy or Satyrane won, although Sansloy appears again in II.ii.37 and Satyrane in III.vii.30. This may be Spenser’s negligence, or it may be his way of saying that the battle was a draw because the two were evenly matched or perhaps even somewhat akin to one another; for a similar implication, see the unresolved battle between Redcrosse and Sansjoy in v.13–15.

Canto Seven The Redcrosse knight is captive made By Gyaunt proud opprest, Prince Arthure meets with Una greatly with those newes distrest.

1

What man so wise, what earthly witt so ware,1 As to discry the crafty cunning traine,2 By which deceipt doth maske in visour3 faire, And cast her coulours died deepe in graine, To seeme like truth, whose shape she well can faine, And fitting gestures to her purpose frame; The guiltlesse man with guile to entertaine?4 Great maistresse of her art was that false Dame, The false Duessa, cloked with Fidessaes name.

2

Who when returning from the drery Night, She fownd not in that perilous hous of Pryde, Where she had left, the noble Redcross knight, Her hoped pray; she would no lenger byde, But forth she went, to seeke him far and wide. Ere long she fownd, whereas he wearie sate, To rest him selfe, foreby a fountaine syde, Disarmed all of yron-coted Plate, And by his side his steed the grassy forage ate.

3

Hee feedes upon the cooling shade, and bayes5 His sweatie forehead in the breathing wynd, Which through the trembling leaves full gently playes Wherein the chearefull birds of sundry kynd Doe chaunt sweet musick, to delight his mynd, The witch approching gan him fayrely greet,

1

ware: wary, wise. traine: here, trickery, scheme. 3 visour: the headpiece of a helmet that can be lowered to cover the face. 2

4 to entertaine: to treat in a specified manner, not always benevolently. 5 bayes: bathes.

102

Canto Seven

103

And with reproch of carelesnes unkynd, Upbrayd, for leaving her in place unmeet, With fowle words tempring faire, soure gall with hony sweet. 4

Unkindnesse past, they gan of solace treat,1 And bathe in pleasaunce of the joyous shade, Which shielded them against the boyling heat, And with greene boughes decking a gloomy glade, About the fountaine like a girlond made; Whose bubbling wave did ever freshly well, Ne ever would through fervent sommer fade The sacred Nymph, which therein wont to dwell, Was out of Dianes favor, as it then befell.

5

The cause was this: one day when Phoebe fayre2 With all her band was following the chace, This Nymph, quite tyr’d with heat of scorching ayre Satt downe to rest in middest of the race: The goddesse wroth gan fowly her disgrace, And badd the waters, which from her did flow, Be such as she her selfe was then in place. Thenceforth her waters wexed dull and slow, And all that drinke thereof, do faint and feeble grow.3

6

Hereof this gentle knight unweeting was, And lying downe upon the sandie graile,4 Dronke of the streame, as cleare as christall glas; Eftsoones his manly forces gan to fayle, And mightie strong was turnd to feeble frayle: His chaunged powres at first them selves not felt,

1

I.e., they began to talk in ways that gave them pleasure. 2 The goddess of the hunt, named both Diana and Phoebe. 3 Redcrosse participates in the nymph’s sloth, her sitting “down to rest in middest of the race,” both by relaxing and by drinking of the nymph’s enfeebling water. St. Paul pictures the Christian life as a race de-

manding self-mastery in 1 Cor. 9.24—an analogue that imparts a spiritual dimension to Redcrosse’s sloth. See the effeminating spring in the myth of Salmacis and Hermaphroditus in Metamorphoses, 4.285–388, esp. 286–7. 4 graile: gravel; OED cites this line as the first instance, though not the only one: “Grail,” 3.

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Till crudled cold his corage1 gan assayle, And chearefull2 blood in fayntnes chill did melt, Which like a fever fit through all his body swelt.3 7

Yet goodly court he made still to his Dame, Pourd out in loosnesse on the grassy grownd, Both carelesse of his health,4 and of his fame: Till at the last he heard a dreadfull sownd, Which through the wood loud bellowing, did rebownd, That all the earth for terror seemd to shake, And trees did tremble. Th’Elfe therewith astownd,5 Upstarted lightly from his looser make,6 And his unready weapons gan in hand to take.

8

But ere he could his armour on him dight,7 Or gett his shield, his monstrous enimy8 With sturdie steps came stalking in his sight, An hideous Geaunt horrible and hye, That with his tallnesse seemd to threat the skye, The ground eke9 groned under him for dreed; His living like saw never living eye, Ne durst behold: his stature did exceed The hight of three the tallest sonnes of mortall seed.10

1 crudled cold: congealed coldness; corage: natural vigor (M&P). 2 chearefull: lively, life-giving. 3 swelt: raged, burned as with a fever (OED, 3b); to say that “fayntnes chill” does this is to say that fever causes chills as well as hotness. In a similar paradox, the cold curdles his vigor and at the same time melts his blood. 4 carelesse of his health: implies penetration, so we know that this sexual act is consummated. 5 astownd: confused. 6 looser make: sexually looser (or very loose) companion. 7 dight: put on. That he hasn’t time to do this, and esp. to grasp his shield, the shield of faith, is crucial. Cf. the prominence of Arthur’s shield in his successful battle with Orgoglio in Canto Eight.

8 Orgoglio is often read as a figure for presumption, “that form of pride most commonly paired with its opposite, despair, so explaining the placement of the Orgoglio and Despair episodes together” (TPR). He is “growen great . . . through presumption of his matchlesse might” (vii.10.1–3). Cf. x.1, a moralizing stanza occurring just after Redcrosse faces Despaire, which rejects the man who “boasts of fleshly might / And vaine assurance of mortalitie.” There, “fleshly might” is said to include even one’s “will” (x.1.9), so it is much more than strength of body. Like Redcrosse, Orgoglio too is said to boast—in this case of being sired by the “blustring” god Aeolus (vii.9.2). 9 eke: moreover. 10 The caesura-less alexandrine mimes his height.

Canto Seven

9

The greatest Earth his uncouth mother was, And blustring Æolus his boasted syre,1 Who with his breath, which through the world doth pas, Her hollow womb did secretly inspyre,2 And fild her hidden caves with stormie yre, That she conceiv’d;3 and trebling the dew time, In which the wombes of wemen doe expyre,4 Brought forth this monstrous masse of earthly slyme, Puft up with emptie wynd, and fild with sinfull cryme.

10

So growen great through arrogant delight Of th’high descent, whereof he was yborne, And through presumption of his matchlesse might, All other powres and knighthood he did scorne. Such now he marcheth to this man forlorne, And left to losse: his stalking steps are stayde Upon a snaggy Oke, which he had torne Out of his mothers bowelles, and it made His mortall mace, wherewith his foemen he dismayde.

11

That when the knight he spyde, he gan advaunce With huge force and insupportable mayne,5 And towardes him with dreadfull fury praunce; Who haplesse, and eke hopelesse; all in vaine Did to him pace, sad battaile to darrayne,6 Disarmd, disgraste, and inwardly dismayde, And eke so faint in every joynt and vayne, Through that fraile fountain, which him feeble made, That scarsely could he weeld his bootlesse single blade.

12

The Geaunt strooke so maynly7 mercilesse, That could have overthrowne a stony towre, And were not hevenly grace, that him did blesse,

1

Aeolus is the god of the winds, and the earth is here sufficiently personified to resemble Gaia, goddess of the earth, in bringing forth giants. 2 inspyre: in its Latin meaning of “breathe into.” 3 Renaissance scientists thought earthquakes were explosions caused by wind in the inner passages of the earth; they were

105

taken as monitory of the Last Judgment. To this extent, Orgoglio represents a punishment. 4 expyre: breathe out, appropriate for a wind; loosely, give birth. 5 mayne: might. 6 darrayne: start a battle “in order to vindicate a claim (a legal term)” (ACH). 7 maynly: mightily.

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He had beene pouldred1 all, as thin as flowre: But he was wary of that deadly stowre, And lightly lept from underneath the blow: Yet so exceeding was the villeins powre That with the winde it did him overthrow, And all his sences stoond,2 that still he lay full low. 13

As when that divelish yron Engin3 wrought In deepest Hell, and framd by Furies 4 skill, With windy Nitre and quick Sulphur fraught, And ramd with bollet5 rownd, ordaind to kill, Conceiveth fyre, the heavens it doth fill With thundring noyse, and all the ayre doth choke, That none can breath, nor see, nor heare at will, Through smouldry cloud of duskish stincking smok, That th’onely breath6 him daunts, who hath escapt the stroke.

14

So daunted when the Geaunt saw the knight, His heavie hand he heaved up on hye, And him to dust thought to have battred quight, Untill Duessa loud to him gan crye; “O great Orgoglio, greatest under skye, O hold thy mortall hand for Ladies sake, Hold for my sake, and doe him not to dye, But vanquisht thine eternall bondslave make, And me thy worthy meed unto thy Leman7 take.”

15

He hearkned, and did stay from further harmes, To gayne so goodly guerdon,8 as she spake: So willingly she came into his armes, Who her as willingly to grace did take,

1

pouldred: pulverized. stoond: stunned. Arthur will be able to withstand a similar maneuver from Orgoglio and turn it to his advantage; see viii.7–10. 3 Many late-medieval and Renaissance writers deplored firearms in general and cannons in particular. See OF, 2.28–31, 88–91. 4 Furies: usually spirits that arrange for retribution, though here the meaning is 2

vaguer, something like spirits of evil. See iii.36.8. 5 bollet: a variant spelling of “bullet,” here in the now-obsolete sense of cannonball. 6 th’onely breath: the blast alone, not the ball. 7 Leman: female paramour. 8 guerdon: reward; see also iii.40.3.

Canto Seven

107

And was possessed of his newfound make.1 Then up he tooke the slombred sencelesse corse, And ere he could out of his swowne awake, Him to his castle brought with hastie forse, And in a Dongeon deep him threw without remorse. 16

From that day forth Duessa was his deare, And highly honourd in his haughtie eye, He gave her gold and purple pall2 to weare, And triple crowne set on her head full hye, And her endowd with royall majestye:3 Then for to make her dreaded more of men, And peoples hartes with awfull terror tye, A monstrous beast ybredd in filthy fen He chose, which he had kept long time in darksom den.

17

Such one it was, as that renowmed Snake Which great Alcides 4 in Stremona slew, Long fostred in the filth of Lerna lake, Whose many heades out budding ever new, Did breed him endlesse labor to subdew:5 But this same Monster much more ugly was; For seven great heads out of his body grew, An yron brest, and back of scaly bras, And all embrewd6 in blood, his eyes did shine as glas.

1

make: mate, match. purple pall: purple robe, symbol of royalty. 3 Duessa already had significantly fancy clothes; see ii.13.1ff. and note ad loc. For her new clothes and equipment, see Rev. 17.3–4: “And I saw a woman sit upon a skarlet-coloured beast, full of names of blasphemie, which had seven heads and ten hornes. And the woman was arrayed in purple and skarlet,b and gilded with gold, and precious stones and pearls, and had a cup of gold in her hand, full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication.” Geneva Bible’s gloss b: “A skarlet colour, that is with a red and purple garment: and 2

surely it was not without cause that the Romish clergie were so much delighted with this colour.” The seven heads of the whore’s beast symbolize, among other things, the seven hills of Rome; see Geneva gloss on Rev. 17.9: “The seven heads,c are seven mountaines whereon the woman sitteth.” Gloss c: “Very children knowe, what that seven hilled citie is, which is so much spoken of.” 4 Alcides: Hercules, who slew the Lernean Hydra. 5 endlesse labor to subdew: the Hydra kept sprouting new heads to replace the damaged ones. 6 embrewd: thoroughly soaked.

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18

His tayle was stretched out in wondrous length, That to the hous of hevenly gods it raught,1 And with extorted powre, and borrow’d strength, The everburning lamps from thence it braught, And prowdly threw to ground, as things of naught; And underneath his filthy feet did tread, The sacred thinges, and holy heastes foretaught.2 Upon this dreadfull Beast with sevenfold head He sett the false Duessa, for more aw and dread.

19

The wofull Dwarfe, which saw his maisters fall, Whiles he had keeping of his grasing steed, And valiant knight become a caytive3 thrall, When all was past, tooke up his forlorne weed, His mightie Armour, missing most at need;4 His silver shield, now idle maisterlesse; His poynant5 speare, that many made to bleed, The ruefull moniments of heavinesse,6 And with them all departes, to tell his great distresse.

20

He had not travaild long, when on the way He wofull Lady, wofull Una met, Fast flying from the Paynims greedy pray,7 Whilest Satyrane him from pursuit did let:8 Who when her eyes she on the Dwarf had set, And saw the signes, that deadly tydinges spake, She fell to ground for sorrowfull regret, And lively breath her sad brest did forsake, Yet might her pitteous hart be seen to pant and quake.

21

The messenger of so unhappie newes, Would faine have dyde: dead was his hart within, Yet outwardly some little comfort shewes:

1 raught: variant form of “reached”; see also vi.29.2. 2 heastes foretaught: commandments taught long ago. The prehensile tail comes from a seven-headed dragon described in Rev. 12.3–4 and associated with the devil: “beholde a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten hornes, and seven crownes upon his heads: And his taile drew the third part of the starres of heaven, and cast them to the earth.”

3 caytive: captive; in a moral sense it can mean base, as in v.11.1. 4 I.e., missing when most needed. 5 poynant: sharp. 6 moniments of heavinesse: reminders or memorials of a loss. 7 pray: here, preying, predation. 8 let: prevent.

Canto Seven

109

At last recovering hart, he does begin To rubb her temples, and to chaufe her chin, And everie tender part does tosse and turne: So hardly1 he the flitted life does win, Unto her native prison to retourne: Then gins her grieved ghost2 thus to lament and mourne. 22

“Ye dreary instruments of dolefull sight, That doe this deadly spectacle behold, Why do ye lenger feed on loathed light, Or liking find to gaze on earthly mould,3 Sith cruell fates the carefull4 threds unfould, The which my life and love together tyde?5 Now let the stony dart of sencelesse cold Perce to my hart, and pas through everie side, And let eternall night so sad sight fro me hide.

23

“O lightsome day, the lampe of highest Jove, First made by him, mens wandring wayes to guyde, When darknesse he in deepest dongeon drove, Henceforth thy hated face for ever hyde, And shut up heavens windowes shyning wyde: For earthly sight can nought but sorow breed, And late repentance, which shall long abyde. Mine eyes no more on vanitie shall feed, But seeled up with death, shall have their deadly meed.”

24

Then downe againe she fell unto the ground; But he her quickly reared up againe: Thrise did she sinke adowne in deadly swownd, And thrise he her reviv’d with busie paine: At last when life recover’d had the raine,6 And over-wrestled his strong enimy,

1

hardly: with difficulty. ghost: spirit. 3 earthly mould: material things. 4 sith: since; carefull: burdened with cares. 5 An elliptical metaphor. The fates spin everyone’s life as a thread or, here, a cord of threads. In Una’s cord, the thread of love is 2

knotted to—i.e., essential to—the thread of life, so that she feels that if she were to lose her beloved, she must die. But now the fates are unfolding—i.e., untying—the two, forcing her to go on living without her love. 6 raine: reign, one of several possible spellings.

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With foltring tong, and trembling everie vaine, “Tell on” (quoth she) “the wofull Tragedy, The which these reliques sad present unto mine eye. 25

“Tempestuous fortune hath spent all her spight, And thrilling sorrow throwne his utmost dart; Thy sad tong cannot tell more heavy plight, Then that I feele, and harbour in mine hart: Who hath endur’d the whole, can beare ech part. If death it be, it is not the first wound, That launched hath my brest with bleeding smart. Begin, and end the bitter balefull stound;1 If lesse, then that I feare, more favour I have found.”

26

Then gan the Dwarfe the whole discourse declare, The subtile traines of Archimago old; The wanton loves of false Fidessa fayre, Bought with the blood of vanquisht Paynim bold: The wretched payre transformd to treen mould;2 The house of Pryde, and perilles round about; The combat, which he with Sansjoy did hould; The lucklesse conflict with the Gyaunt stout, Wherein captiv’d, of life or death he stood in doubt.

27

She heard with patience all unto the end, And strove to maister sorrowfull assay,3 Which greater grew, the more she did contend, And almost rent her tender hart in tway; And love fresh coles unto her fire did lay: For greater love, the greater is the losse. Was never Lady loved dearer day, Then she did love the knight of the Redcrosse; For whose deare sake so many troubles her did tosse.

28

At last when fervent sorrow slaked was, She up arose, resolving him to find Alive or dead: and forward forth doth pas, All as the Dwarfe the way to her assynd:4

1 bitter balefull stound: moment of sorrow; not that grief will cease, but that it will not hurt so much after the first moment.

2

treen mould: the shape of trees. assay: trial. 4 All as: just as; assynd: pointed out. 3

Canto Seven

111

And evermore in constant carefull mind She fedd her wound with fresh renewed bale; Long tost with stormes, and bet1 with bitter wind, High over hills, and lowe adowne the dale, She wandred many a wood, and measurd many a vale. 29

At last she chaunced by good hap to meet A goodly knight, faire marching by the way2 Together with his Squyre, arayed meet: His glitterand armour shined far away, Like glauncing light of Phoebus brightest ray; From top to toe no place appeared bare, That deadly dint of steele endanger may: Athwart his brest a bauldrick3 brave he ware, That shind, like twinkling stars, with stones most pretious rare.

30

And in the midst thereof one pretious stone Of wondrous worth, and eke of wondrous mights, Shapt like a Ladies head,4 exceeding shone, Like Hesperus emongst the lesser lights,5 And strove for to amaze the weaker sights; Thereby his mortall blade full comely hong In yvory sheath, ycarv’d with curious slights;6 Whose hilts were burnisht gold, and handle strong Of mother perle, and buckled with a golden tong.7

31

His haughtie Helmet, horrid8 all with gold, Both glorious brightnesse, and great terrour bredd, For all the crest a Dragon did enfold With greedie pawes, and over all did spredd

1

bet: beaten. This is the first appearance of Prince Arthur. He appears as a more perfect exemplar when the titular knight has lost control of a situation, here and in II.viii; he appears for other reasons in IV.viii, V.viii, and VI.vi. 3 bauldrick: belt worn over the shoulder and diagonally across the chest to carry a sword. 4 Ladies head: the head of Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, who is Arthur’s beloved, as we learn in Canto Nine. 2

5

Hesperus: the planet Venus; lights: stars. curious slights: elaborate designs. Spenser describes Arthur’s armor at such length both because he represents magnificence (“Letter to Raleigh”), which, strictly defined, is the art of spending money well; and to contrast with Redcrosse’s disarmed state when he approached Orgoglio. 7 tong: tongue of the buckle. 8 horrid: bristling. 6

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His golden winges: his dreadfull hideous hedd Close couched on the bever,1 seemd to throw From flaming mouth bright sparckles fiery redd, That suddeine horrour to faint hartes did show; And scaly tayle was stretcht adowne his back full low.2 32

Upon the top of all his loftie crest, A bounch of heares discolourd diversly,3 With sprincled pearle, and gold full richly drest, Did shake, and seemd to daunce for jollity, Like to an Almond tree ymounted hye On top of greene Selinis4 all alone, With blossoms brave bedecked daintily; Her tender locks do tremble every one At everie little breath, that under heaven is blowne.5

33

His warlike shield all closely cover’d was, Ne might of mortall eye be ever seene; Not made of steele, nor of enduring bras, Such earthly mettals soone consumed beene: But all of Diamond perfect pure and cleene It framed was, one massy entire mould,6 Hewen out of Adamant rocke7 with engines keene, That point of speare it never percen could, Ne dint of direfull sword divide the substance would.8

1

This must mean the visor in the modern sense of that word. If its head were couched on the faceplate, the usual meaning of bever, then the faceplate could not be raised when necessary (see II.i.29.1–2). 2 The caesura-less alexandrine mimes the trailing length of the tail (Kaske 1999, 37). 3 discolourd diversly: of various colors. See ii.11.6, which describes the plume worn by Archimago when he is disguised as the Redcrosse Knight and hence, presumably, Redcrosse’s plume as well. 4 green Selinis: “from Virgil’s palmosa Selinus (Aeneid, 3.705), the town of the victor’s palm” (ACH). Since a tree is unlikely to be “on top of ” a town, and “all alone” there, Spenser seems to have interpreted this town as a mountain.

5

“Marlowe quotes these lines to describe Tamburlaine’s triumphant appearance in 2 Tamburlaine 4.3.119–24. See ‘Marlowe’ in SE” (ACH). Marlowe too thinks Selinus is a “celestial mount.” 6 one massy entire mould: shaped wholly of one single diamond, to render it more impenetrable. 7 Diamond and adamant are two closely related stones, here treated as synonymous; the first is real, the second fictional, supposed to exceed all others in hardness. 8 Arthur’s shield is based on Raimondo’s diamond shield in GL, 7.82, which Tasso himself glosses in his “Allegory of Gerusalemme liberata” as “The special custody of the Lord God” (158); on which also see Hankins, 1971, 32. See Ps. 84.11: “For the

Canto Seven

34

The same to wight he never wont disclose, But when as monsters huge he would dismay, Or daunt unequall armies of his foes,1 Or when the flying heavens he would affray:2 For so exceeding shone his glistring ray, That Phoebus golden face it did attaint, As when a cloud his beames doth over-lay And silver Cynthia wexed pale and faynt, As when her face is staynd with magicke arts constraint.3

35

No magicke arts hereof had any might, Nor bloody wordes of bold Enchaunters call, But all that was not such, as seemd in sight, Before that shield did fade, and suddeine fall: And when him list the raskall routes4 appall, Men into stones therewith he could transmew,5 And stones to dust, and dust to nought at all; And when him list the prouder lookes subdew He would them gazing blind, or turne to other hew.

36

Ne let it seeme that credence this exceedes, For he that made the same, was knowne right well To have done much more admirable deedes. It Merlin was, which whylome did excell All living wightes in might of magicke spell: Both shield, and sword, and armour all he wrought For this young Prince, when first to armes he fell, But when he dyde, the Faery Queene it brought To Faerie lond, where yet it may be seene, if sought.

Lord God is the sunne and shielde unto us.” As such, it symbolizes God’s answer to faith. Fidelia, or faith, works some of the same miracles as does this shield; see x.20 and note below. Faith is what Redcrosse’s shield symbolizes, according to the “Letter to Raleigh,” which cites Eph. 6.16, and, as we have seen, the Saracen Sansfoy affirms that the cross on it and on Redcrosse’s breastplate magically protect Redcrosse. 1 Faith has “turned to flight the armies of the aliantes [aliens]” (Heb. 11.34). 2 In the Ptolemaic system, the visible heavens revolve around the earth and, given

113

their size, were thought to go very fast. To affray them would be to damage them, for example, to make them stop or go backward. 3 Magicians were believed to have the power to cause eclipses—i.e., to stain Cynthia (the moon) with “magicke arts.” See VII.vi.16.5. Fidelia, or faith, by her explicitly Christian magic, can even make the sun stop or go backward; see x.20.2–3. 4 raskall routes: crowds of lower-class people. 5 transmew: transmute.

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37

A gentle youth, his dearely loved Squire1 His speare of heben2 wood behind him bare, Whose harmeful head, thrise heated in the fire, Had riven many a brest with pikehead square; A goodly person, and could menage3 faire, His stubborne steed with curbed canon bitt,4 Who under him did amble as the aire,5 And chauft, that any on his backe should sitt; The yron rowels6 into frothy fome he bitt.

38

Whenas this knight nigh to the Lady drew, With lovely court he gan her entertaine; But when he heard her aunswers loth, he knew Some secret sorrow did her heart distraine:7 Which to allay and calme her storming paine, Faire feeling words he wisely gan display, And for her humor fitting purpose faine,8 To tempt the cause it selfe for to bewray;9 Wherewith emmovd, these bleeding words she gan to say.

39

“What worlds delight, or joy of living speach Can hart, so plungd in sea of sorrowes deep, And heaped with so huge misfortunes, reach? The carefull cold beginneth for to creep, And in my heart his yron arrow steep,10 Soone as I thinke upon my bitter bale: Such helplesse harmes yts better hidden keep, Then rip up griefe, where it may not availe, My last left comfort is, my woes to weepe and waile.”

1

Arthur’s squire is named Timias (Greek: “honoured”), and he reappears in Books Three, Four, and Six. He functions as a low-grade version of Arthur, an understudy, to whom calamities happen that might have happened to Arthur, had the latter been less outstanding than he is. 2 heben: ebon, of ebony. 3 menage: control, equestrian term. 4 curbed canon bitt: smooth, round bit (M&P).

5 The 1596 edition has “trample” in place of “amble,” which befits the spirited nature of this horse, but does not accord with “as the aire.” A case could be made for either one. 6 rowels: ends of the bit. 7 distraine: distress. 8 purpose: topic of conversation; faine: here, a variant spelling of “feign,” meaning contrive. 9 bewray: manifest. 10 steep: soak, allow to remain in one place for a long time.

Canto Seven

40

“Ah Lady deare,” quoth then the gentle knight, “Well may I ween, your grief is wondrous great; For wondrous great griefe groneth in my spright, Whiles thus I heare you of your sorrowes treat. But woefull Lady, let me you intrete, For to unfold the anguish of your hart: Mishaps are maistred by advice discrete, And counsell mitigates the greatest smart; Found never help, who never would his hurts impart.”

41

“O but” (quoth she) “great griefe will not be tould, And can more easily be thought, then said.” “Right so” (quoth he) “but he, that never would, Could never: will to might gives greatest aid.” “But griefe” (quoth she) “does greater grow displaid, If then it find not helpe, and breeds despaire.” “Despaire breeds not” (quoth he) “where faith is staid.”1 “No faith so fast” (quoth she) “but flesh does paire.”2 “Flesh may empaire” (quoth he) “but reason can repaire.”

42

His goodly reason, and well guided speach So deepe did settle in her gracious thought, That her perswaded to disclose the breach, Which love and fortune in her heart had wrought, And said “faire Sir, I hope good hap hath brought You to inquere the secrets of my griefe, Or that your wisedome will direct my thought, Or that your prowesse can me yield reliefe: Then heare the story sad, which I shall tell you briefe.

43

“The forlorne Maiden, whom your eies have seene The laughing stocke of fortunes mockeries, Am th’onely daughter of a King and Queene, Whose parents deare whiles equal destinies, Did ronne about, and their felicities The favourable heavens did not envy,

1

staid: variant spelling of “stayed”; propped. 2 paire: impair. This exchange is a stichomythia: a “dialogue in alternate lines,

115

employed in sharp disputation, and characterized by antithesis and . . . taking up of the opponent’s words” (OED).

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Did spred their rule through all the territories, Which Phison and Euphrates floweth by, And Gehons golden waves doe wash continually.1 44

“Till that their cruell cursed enemy, An huge great Dragon horrible in sight, Bred in the loathly lakes of Tartary,2 With murdrous ravine, and devouring might Their kingdome spoild, and countrey wasted quight: Themselves, for feare into his jawes to fall, He forst to castle strong to take their flight, Where fast embard in mighty brasen wall, He has them now fowr years besiegd to make them thrall.3

45

“Full many knights adventurous and stout Have enterprizd that Monster to subdew; From every coast that heaven walks about, Have thither come the noble Martial crew, That famous harde atchievements still pursew, Yet never any could that girlond win, But all still shronke, and still he greater grew: All they for want of faith, or guilt of sin, The pitteous pray of his fiers cruelty have bin.

46

“At last yled with far reported praise, Which flying fame throughout the world had spred, Of doughty knights, whom Fary land did raise, That noble order hight of maidenhed,4 Forthwith to court of Gloriane I sped, Of Gloriane great Queene of glory bright,

1

Phison, Euphrates, and Gehon are three of the four rivers of Paradise, the fourth river being Hiddekel. See Gen. 2.10–4. 2 Tartary: Tartarus, Hell. 3 This is an account of the fall of mankind— a skewed one, in that it puts all the blame upon Satan and pictures his assault as physical. He, not God, expels Adam and Eve from Paradise into a brazen tower that resembles the gate of Hell and the gate of

Hell’s vestibule, Limbo—the place of the virtuous souls before Christ’s redemption, as in the legend of the Harrowing of Hell. 4 The Order of Maidenhead is the order of knights in Faerie Land, foreshadowing the Knights of the Garter, the highest order of knights in England. The emblem of the Knights of the Garter was a figure of St. George slaying the dragon. See II.ii.42; IV.iv 22–48 passim; and V.iv.29.

Canto Seven

117

Whose kingdomes seat Cleopolis1 is red, There to obtaine some such redoubted knight, That Parents deare from tyrants powre deliver might. 47

“Yt was my chaunce (my chaunce was faire and good) There for to find a fresh unproved knight, Whose manly hands imbrewd2 in guilty blood Had never beene, ne ever by his might Had throwne to ground the unregarded3 right: Yet of his prowesse proofe he since hath made (I witnes am) in many a cruell fight; The groning ghosts of many one dismaide Have felt the bitter dint of his avenging blade.

48

“And ye the forlorne reliques of his powre, His biting sword, and his devouring speare, Which have endured many a dreadfull stowre, Can speake his prowesse, that did earst you beare, And well could rule: now he hath left you heare, To be the record of his ruefull losse, And of my dolefull disaventurous deare:4 O heavie record of the good Redcrosse, Where have yee left your lord, that could so well you tosse?5

49

“Well hoped I, and faire beginnings had, That he my captive languor should redeeme,6 Till all unweeting, an Enchaunter bad His sence abusd, and made him to misdeeme My loyalty, not such as it did seeme That rather death desire, then such despight. Be judge ye heavens, that all things right esteeme, How I him lov’d, and love with all my might, So thought I eke7 of him, and think I thought aright.

1 Meaning “fame-city,” capital of Faerie Land. 2 imbrewd: steeped or stained. 3 unregarded: not respected. 4 disaventurous deare: unlucky lover. 5 tosse: wield, handle.

6 I.e., that he should redeem or deliver me from the captivity in which I languished. This could mean that she was imprisoned along with her parents initially and somehow managed to sneak away, or else “captive languor” is just a metaphor for her state of mind. 7 eke: also.

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50

“Thenceforth me desolate he quite forsooke, To wander, where wilde fortune would me lead, And other bywaies he himselfe betooke, Where never foote of living wight did tread, That brought not backe the balefull body dead; In which him chaunced false Duessa meete, Mine onely foe, mine onely deadly dread, Who with her witchcraft and misseeming sweete, Inveigled him to follow her desires unmeete.1

51

“At last by subtile sleights she him betraid Unto his foe, a Gyaunt huge and tall, Who him disarmed, dissolute, dismaid, Unwares surprised, and with mighty mall2 The monster mercilesse him made to fall, Whose fall did never foe before behold; And now in darkesome dungeon, wretched thrall, Remedilesse, for aie3 he doth him hold; This is my cause of griefe, more great, then may be told.”

52

Ere she had ended all, she gan to faint: But he her comforted, and faire bespake, “Certes, Madame, ye have great cause of plaint, That stoutest heart, I weene, could cause to quake. But be of cheare, and comfort to you take: For till I have acquitt your captive knight, Assure your selfe, I will you not forsake.” His chearefull words reviv’d her chearelesse spright, So forth they went, the Dwarfe them guiding ever right.

1 2

unmeete: inappropriate. mall: club, the uprooted oak tree.

3

for aie: for aye, forever.

Canto Eight Faire virgin to redeeme her deare Brings Arthure to the fight: Who slayes the Gyaunt, wounds the beast, And strips Duessa quight.

1

Ay me, how many perils doe enfold The righteous man, to make him daily fall, Were not that heavenly grace doth him uphold, And stedfast truth acquite him out of all: Her love is firme, her care continuall, So oft as he thorough his own foolish pride, Or weaknes is to sinfull bands1 made thrall: Els should this Redcrosse knight in bands have dyde, For whose deliverance she this Prince doth thether guyd.2

2

1

They sadly traveild thus, untill they came Nigh to a castle builded strong and hye: Then cryde the Dwarfe, “lo yonder is the same, In which my Lord my liege doth lucklesse ly, Thrall to that Gyaunts hatefull tyranny: Therefore, deare Sir, your mightie powres assay.” The noble knight alighted by and by From loftie steed, and badd the Ladie stay, To see what end of fight should him befall that day.

bands: bonds, here both physical and moral. 2 Prov. 24.16: “For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth againe, but the wicked fall into mischief.” This moralizing stanza confirms the identification of Una as Truth or the True Church, or, in a general way, the Christian God as active lover of human beings. By concluding with “this prince,” it

may identify Arthur with “heavenly grace,” giving him yet another role besides magnificence or magnanimity (“Letter to Raleigh”). This meaning accords with his activities in Books One and Two, though not elsewhere, and combines well with the overtones of Christ about Arthur in this canto, e.g., the way he conquers by falling, and goes down “a deepe descent as dark as hell” to rescue Redcrosse (39.8).

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3

So with his Squire, th’admirer of his might, He marched forth towardes that castle wall; Whose gates he fownd fast shutt, ne living wight To warde the same, nor answere commers call. Then tooke that Squire an horne of bugle small,1 Which hong adowne his side in twisted gold, And tasselles gay. Wyde wonders over all Of that same hornes great vertues weren told, Which had approved2 bene in uses manifold.

4

Was never wight, that heard that shrilling sownd, But trembling feare did feel in every vaine; Three miles it might be easy heard arownd, And Ecchoes three aunswerd it selfe againe: No false enchauntment, nor deceiptfull traine Might once abide the terror of that blast, But presently was void and wholly vaine: No gate so strong, no locke so firme and fast, But with that percing noise flew open quite, or brast.3

5

The same before the Geaunts gate he blew, That all the castle quaked from the grownd, And every dore of freewill open flew: The Gyaunt selfe dismaied with that sownd, Where he with his Duessa dalliaunce fownd, In hast came rushing forth from inner bowre, With staring countenance sterne, as one astownd,4 And staggering steps, to weet, what suddein stowre, Had wrought that horror strange, and dar’d his dreaded powre.

6

And after him the proud Duessa came, High mounted on her many headed beast,5 And every head with fyrie tongue did flame, And every head was crowned on his creast, And bloody mouthed with late cruell feast. That when the knight beheld, his mightie shild

1

Literally, “bugle” is the entire horn of the wild ox, used as a hunting horn. Some critics allegorize the notes of the horn as the preaching of the gospel.

2

approved: tested, proved by experience. brast: burst. 4 astownd: stunned. 5 For Duessa’s beast, see note to vii.16.5. 3

Canto Eight

121

Upon his manly arme he soone addrest,1 And at him fiersly flew, with corage fild, And eger greedinesse through every member thrild. 7

Therewith the Gyant buckled him to fight, Inflamd with scornefull wrath and high disdaine, And lifting up his dreadfull club on hight, All armd with ragged snubbes2 and knottie graine, Him thought3 at first encounter to have slaine. But wise and wary was that noble Pere, And lightly leaping from so monstrous maine,4 Did fayre avoide the violence him nere; It booted nought, to thinke, such thunderbolts to beare.

8

Ne shame he thought to shonne so hideous might, The ydle5 stroke, enforcing furious way, Missing the marke of his misaymed sight Did fall to ground, and with his heavy sway6 So deepely dinted in the driven clay, That three yardes deepe a furrow up did throw: The sad earth wounded with so sore assay, Did grone full grievous underneath the blow, And trembling with strange feare, did like an erthquake show.

9

As when almightie Jove in wrathfull mood, To wreake the guilt of mortall sins is bent, Hurles forth his thundring dart with deadly food,7 Enrold in flames, and smouldring dreriment, Through riven cloudes and molten firmament; The fiers threeforked engin8 making way, Both loftie towres and highest trees hath rent, And all that might his angry passage stay, And shooting in the earth, castes up a mound of clay.

1

4

2

5

addrest: made ready. snubbes: projecting bits of root; see also vii.10.7. 3 Him thought: the verb is impersonal: it seemed to Orgoglio that he would slay Arthur at his first encounter.

maine: power. ydle: ineffectual. 6 sway: momentum. 7 food: feud. 8 engin: weapon, meaning the lightning.

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10

His boystrous1 club, so buried in the grownd, He could not rearen up againe so light, But that the knight him at advantage fownd, And whiles he strove his combred clubbe to quight, Out of the earth, with blade all burning bright He smott off his left arme, which like a block Did fall to ground, depriv’d of native might; Large streames of blood out of the truncked stock Forth gushed, like fresh water streame from riven rocke.

11

Dismayed with so desperate deadly wound, And eke impatient of unwonted payne, He lowdly brayd with beastly yelling sownd, That all the fieldes rebellowed againe, As great a noyse, as when in Cymbrian plaine2 An heard of Bulles, whom kindly rage doth sting, Doe for the milky mothers want complaine, And fill the fieldes with troublous bellowing, The neighbor woods arownd with hollow murmur ring.

12

That when his deare Duessa heard, and saw The evill stownd, that daungerd her estate, Unto his aide she hastily did draw Her dreadfull beast, who swolne with blood of late Came ramping3 forth with proud presumpteous gate, And threatned all his heades like flaming brandes. But him the Squire made quickly to retrate, Encountring fiers with single sword in hand, And twixt him and his Lord did like a bulwarke stand.

13

The proud Duessa full of wrathfull spight, And fiers disdaine, to be affronted so, Enforst her purple beast with all her might That stop4 out of the way to overthroe, Scorning the let5 of so unequall foe: But nathemore6 would that corageous swayne

1

boystrous: rough and massive. The Cimbri were a savage Teutonic tribe occupying Denmark and Norway (M&P; ACH).

2

3 ramping: rearing for attack, like the lion in iii.5.2. 4 that stop: that obstacle; i.e., Timias. 5 the let: the hindrance. 6 nathemore: not for all that.

Canto Eight

123

To her yeeld passage, gainst his Lord to goe, But with outrageous strokes did him restraine, And with his body bard the way atwixt them twaine. 14

Then tooke the angrie witch her golden cup, Which still she bore, replete with magick artes;1 Death and despeyre did many thereof sup, And secret poyson through their inner partes, Th’eternall bale of heavie wounded harts; Which after charmes and some enchauntments said,2 She lightly sprinkled on his weaker partes; Therewith his sturdie corage soone was quayd,3 And all his sences were with suddein dread dismayd.

15

So downe he fell before the cruell beast, Who on his neck his bloody clawes did seize, That life nigh crusht out of his panting brest: No powre he had to stirre, nor will to rize. That when the carefull knight gan well avise, He lightly left the foe, with whom he fought, And to the beast gan turne his enterprise; For wondrous anguish in his hart it wrought, To see his loved Squyre into such thraldom brought.

16

And high aduauncing his blood-thirstie blade, Stroke one of those deformed heades4 so sore, That of his puissaunce proud ensample made; His monstrous scalpe downe to his teeth it tore, And that misformed shape misshaped more: A sea of blood gusht from the gaping wownd,

1 This is Spenser’s first mention of Duessa’s golden cup, which recalls the gold cup of Revelation “full of abominations, and filthines of her fornication” (Rev. 17.4), which signifies, according to M&P, “the Catholic Mass and what Protestants thought the false and pseudomagical doctrine of transubstantiation,” i.e., the doctrine that when the priest says the words of consecration, the bread and wine become Christ. Retrospectively this reveals Archimago’s general association with magic—which at the time

characterized him as merely the devil in his role as tempter—to be a Roman Catholic trait (i.36ff; ii.Arg.1). Cf. Fidelia’s golden cup in x.13. For other portrayals of the Whore in this pose that Spenser must have known, see SE, “Theatre for Worldlings.” 2 Duessa’s “charmes” and “enchauntments” symbolize the words of consecration. 3 quayd: subdued. 4 A literal echo of Rev. 13.3: “And I sawe one of his heads as it were wounded to death.”

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That her1 gay garments staynd with filthy gore, And overflowed all the field arownd; That over shoes in blood he waded on the grownd. 17

Thereat he rored for exceeding paine, That to have heard, great horror would have bred, And scourging th’emptie ayre with his long trayne, Through great impatience of his grieved hed His gorgeous ryder from her loftie sted Would have cast downe, and trodd in durty myre, Had not the Gyaunt soone her succoured; Who all enrag’d with smart and frantick yre, Came hurtling in full fiers, and forst the knight retyre.

18

The force, which wont in two to be disperst, In one alone left2 hand he now unites, Which is through rage more strong then both were erst; With which his hideous club aloft he dites,3 And at his foe with furious rigor smites, That strongest Oake might seeme to overthrow: The stroke upon his shield so heavie lites, That to the ground it doubleth him full low What mortall wight could ever beare so monstrous blow?

19

And in his fall his shield, that covered was,4 Did loose his vele by chaunce, and open flew: The light whereof, that hevens light did pas, Such blazing brightnesse through the ayer threw, That eye mote5 not the same endure to vew. Which when the Gyaunt spyde with staring eye, He downe let fall his arme, and soft withdrew His weapon huge, that heaved was on hye, For to have slain the man, that on the ground did lye.

1

I.e., Duessa’s. left: both left as opposed to right and left as remaining; pun. 3 dites: lifts, raises; an erroneous usage by Spenser (OED, 16). 2

4

The action parallels that of Ruggiero’s accidentally uncovered shield in OF, 22.84–7. Here, it symbolizes that God’s grace shines out when the hero is at his weakest, suggesting the way Christ conquered through defeat and suffering. 5 mote: might.

Canto Eight

20

And eke the fruitfull-headed1 beast, amazd At flashing beames of that sunshiny shield, Became stark blind, and all his sences dazd That downe he tumbled on the durtie field, And seemd himselfe as conquered to yield. Whom when his maistresse proud perceiv’d to fall, Whiles yet his feeble feet for faintnesse reeld, Unto the Gyaunt lowdly she gan call, “O helpe Orgoglio, helpe, or els we perish all.”

21

At her so pitteous cry was much amoov’d, Her champion stout, and for to ayde his frend, Againe his wonted angry weapon proov’d:2 But all in vaine: for he has redd his end In that bright shield, and all their forces spend Them selves in vaine: for since that glauncing3 sight, He hath no poure to hurt, nor to defend; As where th’Almighties lightning brond does light, It dimmes the dazed eyen, and daunts the sences quight.

22

Whom when the Prince, to batteill new addrest, And threatning high his dreadfull stroke did see, His sparkling blade about his head he blest,4 And smote off quite his right leg by the knee, That downe he tombled; as an aged tree, High growing on the top of rocky clift, Whose hartstrings with keene steele nigh hewen be, The mightie trunck halfe rent, with ragged rift Doth roll adowne the rocks, and fall with fearefull drift.5

23

Or as a Castle reared high and round, By subtile engins and malitious slight6 Is undermined from the lowest ground, And her foundation forst,7 and feebled quight, At last downe falles, and with her heaped hight Her hastie ruine does more heavie make,

1

fruitfull-headed: many-headed, suggesting fruits on a tree. 2 proov’d: here, put to use. 3 glauncing: flashing.

4

blest: brandished. drift: momentum. 6 slight: trick. 7 forst: penetrated. 5

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And yields it selfe unto the victours might; Such was this Gyaunts fall, that seemd to shake The stedfast globe of earth, as it for feare did quake. 24

The knight then lightly leaping to the pray, With mortall steele him smot againe so sore, That headlesse his unweldy bodie lay, All wallowd in his owne fowle bloody gore, Which flowed from his wounds in wondrous store. But soone as breath out of his breast did pas, That huge great body, which the Gyaunt bore, Was vanisht quite, and of that monstrous mas Was nothing left, but like an emptie blader was.1

25

Whose grievous fall, when false Duessa spyde, Her golden cup she cast unto the ground, And crowned mitre2 rudely threw asyde; Such percing griefe her stubborne hart did wound, That she could not endure that dolefull stound, But leaving all behind her, fled away: The light-foot Squyre her quickly turnd around, And by hard meanes enforcing her to stay, So brought unto his Lord, as his deserved pray.

26

The roiall Virgin, which beheld from farre, In pensive plight, and sad perplexitie, The whole atchievement of this doubtfull3 warre, Came running fast to greet his victorie, With sober gladnesse, and myld modestie, And with sweet joyous cheare him thus bespake; “Fayre braunch of noblesse, flowre of chevalrie, That with your worth the world amazed make, How shall I quite4 the paynes, ye suffer for my sake?

1

Besides being a powerful image of the downfall of anyone who is proud (see Colin Clout, 715–8), this line suggests detumescence and hints that one of Orgoglio’s many meanings is as an erect phallus, which is appropriate to Redcrosse’s activity in the previous episode. In line with this, ACH explains that the name “Orgoglio” is Italian for “Pride,” and the Greek verb that sounds like it means “to be swollen with lust,” sug-

gesting that he “is man ‘rashly puft up with his fleshly minde’ (Col. 2.18).” M&P give a similar interpretation and secondary sources in their survey of Orgoglio’s many meanings at vii.9. 2 crowned mitre: the triple tiara of the popes. 3 doubtfull: hotly contested. 4 quite: repay.

Canto Eight

27

“And you1 fresh budd of vertue springing fast, Whom these sad eyes saw nigh unto deaths dore, What hath poore Virgin for such perill past, Wherewith you to reward? Accept therefore My simple selfe, and service evermore: And he that high does sit, and all things see With equall eye, their merites to restore, Behold what ye this day have done for mee, And what I cannot quite, requite with usuree.2

28

“But sith the heavens, and your faire handeling Have made you master of the field this day, Your fortune maister eke with governing, And well begonne end all so well, I pray, Ne let that wicked woman scape away; For she it is, that did my Lord bethrall, My dearest Lord, and deepe in dongeon lay, Where he his better dayes hath wasted all. O heare, how piteous he to you for ayd does call.”

29

Forthwith he gave in charge unto his Squyre, That scarlot whore to keepen carefully; Whyles he himselfe with greedie great desyre Into the Castle entred forcibly, Where living creature none he did espye; Then gan he lowdly through the house to call: But no man car’d to answere to his crye. There raignd a solemne silence over all, Nor voice was heard, nor wight was seene in bowre or hall.

30

At last with creeping crooked pace forth came An old old man, with beard as white as snow, That on a staffe his feeble steps did frame,3 And guyde his wearie gate both too and fro; For his eye sight him fayled long ygo, And on his arme a bounch of keyes he bore,

1

I.e., Timias. quite: repay; usuree: interest. The distinction is unclear; perhaps to repay with usury means to repay with money.

2

3

frame: manage to make.

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The which unused rust did overgrow: Those were the keyes of every inner dore, But he could not them use, but kept them still in store.1 31

But very uncouth sight was to behold, How he did fashion his untoward pace, For as he forward moovd his footing old, So backward still was turnd his wrincled face, Unlike to men, who ever as they trace, Both feet and face one way are wont to lead.2 This was the auncient keeper of that place, And foster father of the Gyaunt dead; His name Ignaro did his nature right aread.3

32

His reverend heares and holy gravitee The knight much honord, as beseemed well, And gently askt, where all the people bee, Which in that stately building wont to dwell. Who answerd him full soft, he could not tell. Againe he askt, where that same knight was layd, Whom great Orgoglio with his puissaunce fell Had made his caytive thrall; againe he sayde, He could not tell: ne ever other answere made.

33

Then asked he, which way he in might pas: He could not tell, againe he answered. Thereat the courteous knight displeased was, And said, “Old syre, it seemes thou hast not red4 How ill it sits with that same silver hed, In vaine to mocke, or mockt in vaine to bee:

1

Ignaro and his useless keys are usually interpreted as the Catholic Church or clergy who have the keys to salvation—i.e., the scriptures, esp. the New Testament—but who do not know how to use or apply them because of ignorance. 2 Ignaro’s backward-looking head symbolizes the alleged Roman Catholic preoccupation with legalism and the Old Law, which was dismissed by Protestants as having been abrogated. The head symbolizes their insufficient appreciation of the radical

newness of the New Testament (M&P), based as it is on spontaneous love. Ignaro’s inability to say anything to the purpose links him to Abessa’s utter speechlessness in Canto Three. 3 aread: express. Ignaro’s blindness relates him to Corceca in Canto Three; she too represents the ignorance of some Roman Catholics. For further details, see “Ignaro” in SE. 4 red: learned.

Canto Eight

129

But if thou be, as thou art pourtrahed With natures pen,1 in ages grave degree, Aread in graver wise, what I demaund of thee.” 34

His answere likewise was, he could not tell. Whose sencelesse speach, and doted ignorance2 When as the noble Prince had marked well, He ghest his nature by his countenance, And calmd his wrath with goodly temperance. Then to him stepping, from his arme did reach Those keyes, and made himselfe free enterance.3 Each dore he opened without any breach;4 There was no barre to stop, nor foe him to empeach. 5

35

There all within full rich arayd he found, With royall arras6 and resplendent gold, And did with store of every thing abound, That greatest Princes presence might behold. But all the floore (too filthy to be told) With blood of guiltlesse babes, and innocents trew, Which there were slaine, as sheepe out of the fold, Defiled was, that dreadfull was to vew, And sacred ashes over it was strowed new.7

1 pourtrahed with natures pen: as your physical appearance indicates. 2 doted ignorance: ignorance resulting from age, which has taken away his mind. 3 The Scriptures, Spenser seems to be saying, must be appropriated forcibly by the laity, who had been forbidden to read them, not only by Catholics but, in one of his moods, even by Henry VIII. 4 breach: forcing. 5 empeach: oppose. 6 arras: tapestries hung on walls to prevent drafts; they were often exceedingly beautiful and ornate. 7 Referring to all who were killed on some religious charge. The babies suggest, among

other things, the Slaughter of the Innocents in Matt. 2.16–8. The ashes suggests those martyrs who were burned, and the fact that they were scattered “new” suggests contemporaneous martyrdoms of Protestants by Catholics, esp. both in the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in Paris on August 24, 1572, and by the Spanish in the Netherlands, a subject treated in Book Five. See Rev. 6.9–10: “I saw under the altar the soules of them, that were killed for the worde of God, and for the testimonie which they maintained. And they cried with a lowde voyce, saying, How long, Lord, holie and true! doest not thou judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?”

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36

And there beside of marble stone was built An Altare, carv’d with cunning ymagery, On which trew Christians blood was often spilt, And holy Martyres often doen to dye, With cruell malice and strong tyranny: Whose blessed sprites from underneath the stone To God for vengeance cryde continually, And with great griefe were often heard to grone, That hardest heart would bleede, to heare their piteous mone.

37

Through every rowme he sought, and everie bowr, But no where could he find that wofull thrall: At last he came unto an yron doore, That fast was lockt, but key found not at all Emongst that bounch, to open it withall; But in the same a little grate was pight,1 Through which he sent his voyce, and lowd did call With all his powre, to weet, if living wight Were housed therewithin, whom he enlargen might.2

38

Therewith an hollow, dreary, murmuring voyce These pitteous plaintes and dolours did resound; “O who is that, which bringes me happy choyce Of death, that here lye dying every stound,3 Yet live perforce in balefull4 darkenesse bound? For now three Moones have changed thrice their hew, And have beene thrice hid underneath the ground, Since I the heavens chearefull face did vew, O welcome thou, that doest of death bring tydings trew.”

39

Which when that Champion heard, with percing point Of pitty deare his hart was thrilled sore, And trembling horrour ran through every joynt, For ruth of gentle knight so fowle forlore:5 Which shaking off, he rent that yron dore, With furious force, and indignation fell;

1

4

2

5

pight: inset, installed. enlargen might: might set free. 3 stound: hour.

balefull: dire, deathlike. forlore: abandoned.

Canto Eight

131

Where entred in, his foot could find no flore, But all a deepe descent, as darke as hell,1 That breathed ever forth a filthie banefull smell. 40

But nether darkenesse fowle, nor filthy bands, Nor noyous2 smell his purpose could withhold, (Entire affection hateth nicer3 hands) But that with constant zele, and corage bold, After long paines and labors manifold, He found the meanes that Prisoner up to reare; Whose feeble thighes, unhable to uphold His pined corse,4 him scarse to light could beare, A ruefull spectacle of death and ghastly drere.5

41

His sad dull eies deepe sunck in hollow pits, Could not endure th’unwonted sunne to view; His bare thin cheekes for want of better bits,6 And empty sides deceived of their dew, Could make a stony hart his hap to rew; His rawbone armes, whose mighty brawned bowrs7 Were wont to rive steele plates, and helmets hew, Were clene consum’d, and all his vitall powres Decayd, and al his flesh shronk up like withered flowres.

42

Whome when his Lady saw, to him she ran With hasty joy: to see him made her glad, And sad to view his visage pale and wan, Who earst in flowres of freshest youth was clad. Tho8 when her well of teares she wasted had, She said, “Ah dearest Lord, what evill starre On you hath frownd, and pourd his influence bad, That of your selfe ye thus berobbed arre, And this misseeming hew your manly looks doth marre?

1

A suggestion of Christ’s Harrowing of Hell, making Arthur a Christ figure. Other analogies are the low, dark, smelly place and the bursting of a metal door—both occasional features of accounts of Christ’s Harrowing of Hell. See ACH note to stanzas 39 and 40, and “Hell” in SE. 2 noyous: noxious.

3

nicer: too fastidious. See also II.ii.3.1–3. pined corse: emaciated body. 5 drere: wretchedness. 6 better bits: proper food, suggesting mouthfuls to fill out his cheeks (ACH). 7 bowrs: muscles. The picture suggests spiritual malaise. 4

8

Tho: then.

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43

“But welcome now my Lord, in wele or woe, Whose presence I have lackt too long a day; And fie on Fortune mine avowed foe, Whose wrathfull wreakes1 them selves do now alay. And for these wronges shall treble penaunce2 pay Of treble good: good growes of evils priefe.”3 The chearelesse man, whom sorow did dismay, Had no delight to treaten4 of his griefe; His long endured famine needed more reliefe.

44

“Faire Lady, then said that victorious knight, The things, that grievous were to doe, or beare, Them to renew,5 I wote, breeds no delight; Best musicke breeds delight in loathing eare:6 But th’only good, that growes of passed feare, Is to be wise, and ware of like agein. This daies ensample hath this lesson deare Deepe written in my heart with yron pen, That blisse may not abide in state of mortall men.

45

“Henceforth Sir knight, take to you wonted strength, And maister these mishaps with patient might; Loe wher your foe lies stretcht in monstrous length, And loe that wicked woman in your sight, The roote of all your care, and wretched plight, Now in your powre, to let her live, or die.” “To doe her die” (quoth Una) “were despight, And shame t’avenge so weake an enimy; But spoile7 her of her scarlot robe, and let her fly.”

1

wreakes: calamities, without the usual sense of retribution. 2 penaunce: satisfaction. 3 evils priefe: testing by evil. 4 to treaten: to discuss; “-en” is the sign of the infinitive in Middle English. 5 renew: remember, recount. 6 This line is a much-discussed puzzle. ACH tells us that older critics emended it, but more modest modern critics construe the text, as we have it, in one of two ways: 1) “music best breeds delight, not a recital of grievous matters,” or 2) “only the best

music, not a recital of grievous matters, may breed delight.” 7 spoile: despoile, strip. Spenser “carefully avoids bringing in the destruction of the Scarlet Whore” (Rev. 17.16). Nevertheless “her exit in nakedness and desolation” owes something to it (TPR on stanzas 46 and 50). This stripping symbolizes the full disclosure that Truth seeks; her vengeance goes no further. In external action, it echoes the revelation of Alcina deprived of her magical beauty aids to the rescued Ruggiero in OF, 7.70–74.

Canto Eight

46

So as she bad, that witch they disaraid, And robd of roiall robes, and purple pall,1 And ornaments that richly were displaid; Ne spared they to strip her naked all. Then when they had despoyld her tire and call,2 Such as she was, their eies might her behold, That her misshaped parts did them appall, A loathly, wrinckled hag, ill favoured, old, Whose secret filth good manners biddeth not be told.

47

Her crafty head was altogether bald, And as in hate of honorable eld,3 Was overgrowne with scurfe and filthy scald;4 Her teeth out of her rotten gummes were feld, And her sowre breath abhominably smeld; Her dried dugs, lyke bladders lacking wind, Hong downe, and filthy matter from them weld; Her wrizled5 skin as rough, as maple rind, So scabby was, that would have loathd all womankind.6

48

Her neather parts, the shame of all her kind, My chaster Muse for shame doth blush to write;7 But at her rompe she growing had behind A foxes taile, with dong all fowly dight;8 And eke her feete most monstrous were in sight; For one of them was like an Eagles claw, With griping talaunts9 armd to greedy fight, The other like a beares uneven paw: More ugly shape yet never living creature saw.

1

pall: robe or cloak, usually purple. tire and call: attire and headdress; see the quotation from Isaiah below. 3 in hate of honorable eld: such as would cause hatred for those whose old age would otherwise claim honor (ACH); an elliptical expression. 4 scurfe and filthy scald: scabs and a scabby disease. 5 wrizled: wrinkled. 6 I.e., that would have been disgusting to all womankind. 2

133

7 See Isaiah 3.17, 24: “Therefore shal the Lord make the heads of the daughters of Zion balde, and the Lord shal discover their secret partes. In that day shal the Lord take away . . . the calles, and the round tyres . . . And in stead of swete savour, there shalbe stinke, and in stead of a girdle, a rent, and in stead of dressing of the heere, baldnes . . . and burning in stead of beautie” (ACH). 8 dight: dressed, arranged. 9 talaunts: talons.

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49

Which when the knights beheld, amazd they were, And wondred at so fowle deformed wight. “Such then” (said Una) “as she seemeth here, Such is the face of falshood, such the sight Of fowle Duessa, when her borrowed light Is laid away, and counterfesaunce knowne.” Thus when they had the witch disrobed quight, And all her filthy feature open showne, They let her goe at will, and wander waies unknowne.

50

Shee flying fast from heavens hated face, And from the world that her discovered wide, Fled to the wastfull wildernesse apace, From living eies her open shame to hide, And lurkt in rocks and caves long unespide. But that faire crew of knights, and Una faire Did in that castle afterwards abide, To rest them selves, and weary powres repaire, Where store they fownd of al, that dainty was and rare.

Canto Nine His loves and lignage Arthure tells the knights knitt friendly hands: Sir Trevisan flies from Despeyre, Whom Redcros knight withstands.

1

O Goodly golden chayne, wherewith yfere1 The vertues linked are in lovely wize: And noble mindes of yore allyed were, In brave poursuitt of chevalrous emprize, That none did others safety despize, Nor aid envy to him, in need that stands,2 But friendly each did others praise devize, How to advaunce with favourable hands, As this good Prince redeemd the Redcrosse knight from bands.3

2

Who when their powres empayrd through labor long, With dew repast they had recured well,4 And that weake captive wight now wexed strong, Them list no lenger there at leasure dwell, But forward fare, as their adventures fell, But ere they parted, Una faire besought That straunger knight his name and nation tell; Least so great good, as he for her had wrought, Should die unknown, and buried be in thankles thought.

3

“Faire virgin” (said the Prince) “yee me require A thing without5 the compas of my witt: For both the lignage and the certein Sire,

1

yfere: together as equals. I.e., nor begrudge aid to him who stands in need. 3 Spenser’s “Goodly golden chayne” is a horizontal chain and is used in a favorable sense, allied with the virtues of chivalry. Elsewhere, Spenser’s vertical golden chain is 2

used in a derogatory sense; see II.vii.46–47; so also Homer, Iliad, 8.18–27. 4 dew repast: sufficient rest as well as food (ACH); recured well: well recovered. Redcrosse later proves himself to be less than fully recovered. 5 without: outside.

135

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From which I sprong, from mee are hidden yitt.1 For all so soone as life did me admitt Into this world, and shewed hevens light, From mothers pap I taken was unfitt: And streight delivered to a Fary knight, To be upbrought in gentle thewes2 and martiall might. 4

“Unto old Timon he me brought bylive,3 Old Timon, who in youthly yeares hath beene In warlike feates th’expertest man alive, And is the wisest now on earth I weene; His dwelling is low in a valley greene, Under the foot of Rauran mossy hore,4 From whence the river Dee as silver cleene His tombling billowes rolls with gentle rore:5 There all my daies he traind me up in vertuous lore.

5

“Thether the great magicien Merlin came, As was his use, ofttimes to visitt mee For he had charge my discipline6 to frame, And Tutors nouriture to oversee. Him oft and oft I askt in privity, Of what loines and what lignage I did spring. Whose aunswere bad me still assured bee, That I was sonne and heire unto a king, As time in her just term the truth to light should bring.”

6

“Well worthy impe,”7 said then the Lady gent, “And Pupill fitt for such a Tutors hand. But what adventure, or what high intent

1

In Le Morte D’Arthur, Book One, Malory gives the young Arthur to Sir Ector and keeps the former ignorant of his lineage for a short time; but Spenser never reveals Arthur’s lineage to him in this poem as we have it. Arthur knows only that he is “sonne and heire unto a king” (5.8), though Spenser reveals everything to us over Arthur’s head in II.x.68. 2 thewes: manners as distinct from fighting ability. See also Redcrosse’s praise of Guyon (II.i.33.9). 3 he: presumably Merlin, who is mentioned later; bylive: immediately.

4

mossy hore: hoary or grey with moss. Dee and Rauran are a river and a hill in Wales—a country originally and still, to some extent, inhabited by Britons or Celts, not Anglo-Saxons; and the country whence the Tudors originated. 6 discipline: both instruction and practical training by reward and punishment. The “Letter to Raleigh” claims it to be the goal of the present poem: “to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline.” 7 impe: scion, offspring, with no sense of the modern “impish.” 5

Canto Nine

137

Hath brought you hether into Fary land, Aread1 Prince Arthure, crowne of Martiall band?” “Full hard it is” (quoth he) “to read aright The course of heavenly cause, or understand The secret meaning of th’eternall might, That rules mens waies, and rules the thoughts of living wight. 7

“For whether he2 through fatal deepe foresight Me hither sent, for cause to me unghest, Or that fresh bleeding wound, which day and night Whilome doth rancle in my riven3 brest, With forced fury following his behest,4 Me hether brought by wayes yet never found, You to have helpt I hold my selfe yet blest.” “Ah courteous knight” (quoth she) “what secret wound Could ever find, to grieve the gentlest hart on ground?”5

8

“Deare Dame” (quoth he) “you sleeping sparkes awake, Which troubled once, into huge flames will grow, Ne ever will their fervent fury slake, Till living moysture into smoke do flow, And wasted life doe lye in ashes low. Yet sithens6 silence lesseneth not my fire, But told it flames, and hidden it does glow, I will revele, what ye so much desire: Ah Love, lay down thy bow, the whiles I may respyre.

9

“It was in freshest flowre of youthly yeares, When corage7 first does creepe in manly chest, Then first the cole of kindly heat appeares To kindle love in every living brest; But me had warnd old Timons8 wise behest,

1

aread: tell, explain. he: “th’eternall might” mentioned in previous stanza; a vague reference to God. 3 riven: split open. Perfect passive participle of rive, meaning to split open. 4 his behest: Love’s command. 5 find, to: contrive to; on ground: on the earth. 6 sithens: since. 2

7

corage: typically courage, but sometimes love or lust, as here; Spenser spells it this way to emphasize its derivation from the Latin word cor, “heart.” 8 Timon does not appear in the sources. 1590 edition has “Cleons,” a name otherwise unattested in the poem, which was corrected to “Timons” in F.E., 1596. The error reveals Spenser’s rationale for naming. It is etymological: both Cleon and Timon

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Those creeping flames by reason to subdew,1 Before their rage grew to so great unrest, As miserable lovers use to rew, Which still wex old in woe, whiles wo stil wexeth new. 10

“That ydle name of love, and lovers life, As losse of time, and vertues enimy I ever scornd, and joyd to stirre up strife, In middest of their mournfull Tragedy, Ay wont to laugh, when them I heard to cry, And blow the fire, which them to ashes brent: Their God2 himselfe, grievd at my libertie, Shott many a dart at me with fiers intent, But I them warded all with wary government.3

11

“But all in vaine: no fort can be so strong, Ne fleshly brest can armed be so sownd, But will at last be wonne with battrie4 long, Or unawares at disavantage fownd: Nothing is sure, that growes on earthly grownd: And who most trustes in arme of fleshly might, And boastes, in beauties chaine not to be bownd, Doth soonest fall in disaventrous5 fight, And yeeldes his caytive neck to victours most despight.6

12

“Ensample make of him your haplesse joy, And of my selfe now mated,7 as ye see; Whose prouder vaunt that proud avenging boy Did soone pluck downe, and curbd my libertee. For on a day prickt forth with jollitee8

are based on Greek words for “fame, honor, and glory”—see Cleopolis and Timias—values that are the goal of Arthur’s stated virtue of magnificence/magnanimity. 1 So Glauce advises Britomart in the first throes of love; and again the advice proves impracticable (III.ii.46). 2 I.e., Cupid. 3 government: self-government, self-control; synonymous with governance. 4 battrie: military attacks. 5 disaventrous: disastrous.

6 Redcrosse made the same error (i.12.9). “Fleshly might” (line 6) is not physical but moral, as the next line—“and boasts, in beauties chaine not to be bownd”—makes clear. 7 mated: overcome, from “checkmated” in chess. 8 The following story is based, perhaps remotely, on Celtic folktales of forward fairy mistresses. This interview disturbingly recalls the love offered to the dreaming Redcrosse by the false Una (i.43ff.). Chaucer tells a derisive version of this story in “The Tale of Sir Thopas”; see ACH ad loc.

Canto Nine

139

Of looser life, and heat of hardiment,1 Raunging the forest wide on courser free, The fields, the floods, the heavens with one consent Did seeme to laugh on me, and favour mine intent. 13

“For wearied with my sportes, I did alight From loftie steed, and downe to sleepe me layd; The verdant gras my couch did goodly dight, And pillow was my helmett fayre displayd: Whiles every sence the humour sweet embayd,2 And slombring soft my hart did steale away Me seemed, by my side a royall Mayd Her daintie limbes full softly down did lay: So fayre a creature yet saw never sunny day.

14

“Most goodly glee and lovely blandishment3 She to me made, and badd me love her deare; For dearely sure her love was to me bent, As when just time expired should appeare.4 But whether dreames delude, or true it were, Was never hart so ravisht with delight, Ne living man like wordes did ever heare, As she to me delivered all that night; And at her parting said, She Queene of Faries hight.5

15

“When I awoke, and found her place devoyd, And nought but pressed gras where she had lyen,6 I sorrowed all so much, as earst I joyd, And washed all her place with watry eyen. From that day forth I lov’d that face divyne; From that day forth I cast in carefull mynd,

1

looser: very relaxed, almost too relaxed; hardiment: boldness. 2 humour: moisture, the dews of night or of sleep; embayd: bathed, suffused. 3 I.e., fine entertainment and loving flattery. Critics have debated not only “how far they went” (since fairy mistresses have looser morals than do humans), but also whether the entire incident was a delusion and whether it is so allegorical that it does

not matter. The incident allegorizes how fame, honor, and glory seem to seek out certain people, whereas others who may seem equally meritorious cannot “get to first base.” 4 I.e., which would appear when an appropriate amount of time had expired. 5 hight: was called. 6 lyen: lain. Middle English form.

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To seeke her out with labor, and long tyne,1 And never vowd to rest,2 till her I fynd, Nyne monethes I seek in vain yet ni’ll that vow unbynd.”3 16

Thus as he spake, his visage wexed pale, And chaunge of hew great passion did bewray; Yett still he strove to cloke his inward bale,4 And hide the smoke, that did his fire display, Till gentle Una thus to him gan say; “O happy Queene of Faries, that hast fownd Mongst many, one that with his prowesse may Defend thine honour, and thy foes confownd: True Loves are often sown, but seldom grow on grownd.”

17

“Thine,5 O then,” said the gentle Redcrosse knight, “Next to that Ladies love, shalbe the place,6 O fayrest virgin, full of heavenly light, Whose wondrous faith, exceeding earthly race, Was firmest fixt in myne extremest case. And you, my Lord, the Patrone of my life, Of that great Queene may well gaine worthie grace: For onely worthie you through prowes priefe7 Yf living man mote worthie be, to be her liefe.”8

18

So diversly discoursing of their loves, The golden Sunne his glistring head gan shew, And sad remembraunce now the Prince amoves, With fresh desire his voyage to pursew:

1

tyne: toil. never vowd to rest: vowed never to rest. 3 Arthur’s quest. Since everyone else knows where Gloriana is—i.e., in her capital city Cleopolis—and could easily inform him, his quest is less a matter of geographic knowledge than of proving his worthiness of her. Britomart’s quest, too, is for a beloved seen in a special vision (III.ii). 4 bale: pain, here psychological pain. See “balefull” in the Glossary. 5 I.e., Una’s. 2

6

Stanza 17, lines 1 through 4 are difficult because they illustrate Spenser’s characteristic indefinite pronoun reference. I.e., Una’s love will be placed in Redcrosse’s heart next to the love of Gloriana, his current ruler, and to his love of that glory and honor which she symbolizes. See Richard Lovelace’s lyric: “I could not love thee, dear, so much, / Loved I not honour more” (“To Lucasta, Going to the Wars,” Aldington, ed., 446–7). 7 prowes priefe: the proof of prowess (which we have just seen). 8 liefe: beloved.

Canto Nine

141

Als Una earnd her traveill to renew.1 Then those two knights, fast frendship for to bynd, And love establish each to other trew, Gave goodly gifts, the signes of gratefull mynd, And eke as pledges firme, right hands together joynd. 19

Prince Arthur gave a boxe of Diamond sure, Embowd with gold and gorgeous ornament, Wherein were closd few drops of liquor pure, Of wondrous worth, and vertue excellent, That any wownd could heale incontinent:2 Which to requite, the Redcrosse knight him gave A booke, wherein his Saveours testament Was writt with golden letters rich and brave; A worke of wondrous grace, and hable soules to save.3

20

Thus beene they parted, Arthur on his way To seeke his love, and th’other for to fight With Unaes foe, that all her realme did pray.4 But she now weighing the decayed plight, And shrunken synewes of her chosen knight, Would not a while her forward course pursew, Ne bring him forth in face of dreadfull fight, Till he recovered had his former hew: For him to be yet weake and wearie well she knew.

21

So as they traveild, lo they gan espy An armed knight towards them gallop fast, That seemed from some feared foe to fly, Or other griesly thing, that him agast.5 Still as he fledd, his eye was backward cast, As if his feare still followed him behynd;

1

als Una earnd: also Una yearned. incontinent: immediately. 3 The gifts symbolize the givers, not the recipients; the fanciness of the box expresses the straightforward sense of Arthur’s virtue, magnificence, which is the ability to spend money well. Critics debate what the “liquor pure” symbolizes. Arthur keeps some liquor for himself, for he uses this liquor to cure the wounds of Amoret in IV.viii.20. The 2

book Redcrosse gives is the New Testament. To judge by their gifts, Redcrosse belongs to the spiritual world, despite his sins, whereas Arthur, by contrast, seems to belong to the external material world in his pervasive role, despite his temporary role in Canto Eight and II.viii of a Christ figure and a seemingly internal divine grace. 4 pray: prey on. 5 that him agast: that made him aghast.

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Als flew his steed, as he his bandes had brast,1 And with his winged heeles did tread the wynd, As he had beene a fole of Pegasus his kynd.2 22

Nigh as he drew, they might perceive his head To bee unarmd, and curld uncombed heares Upstaring stiffe, dismaid with uncouth dread; Nor drop of blood in all his face appeares Nor life in limbe: and to increase his feares, In fowle reproch of knighthoodes fayre degree,3 About his neck an hempen rope he weares, That with his glistring armes does ill agree; But he of rope or armes has now no memoree.

23

The Redcrosse knight toward him crossed fast, To weet, what mister wight4 was so dismayd: There him he findes all sencelesse and aghast, That of him selfe he seemd to be afrayd, Whom hardly he from flying forward stayd, Till he these wordes to him deliver might; “Sir knight, aread who hath ye thus arayd, And eke from whom make ye this hasty flight: For never knight I saw in such misseeming5 plight.”

24

He answerd nought at all, but adding new Feare to his first amazment, staring wyde With stony eyes, and hartlesse hollow hew, Astonisht stood, as one that had aspyde Infernall furies, with their chaines untyde. Him yett againe, and yett againe bespake The gentle knight, who nought to him replyde, But trembling every joynt did inly quake, And foltring tongue at last these words seemd forth to shake.

25

“For Gods deare love, Sir knight, doe me not stay; For loe he comes, he comes fast after mee.” Eft6 looking back would faine have runne away; But he him forst to stay, and tellen free The secrete cause of his perplexitie,

1

I.e., as if he had just broken free. I.e., as if he had been a foal of Pegasus’ species, and so winged. 3 degree: rank, status. 2

4

what mister wight: what kind of a person. 5 misseeming: unseemly. 6 eft: again.

Canto Nine

143

Yet nathemore1 by his bold hartie speach, Could his blood frosen hart emboldened bee, But through his boldnes rather feare did reach, Yett forst, at last he made through silence suddein breach. 26

“And am I now in safetie sure” (quoth he) “From him, that would have forced me to dye? And is the point of death now turnd fro mee, That I may tell this haplesse history?” “Feare nought:” (quoth he) “no daunger now is nye.” “Then shall I you recount a ruefull cace,” (Said he) “the which with this unlucky eye I late beheld, and had not greater grace Me reft from it, had bene partaker of the place.2

27

“I lately chaunst (Would I had never chaunst) With a fayre knight to keepen companee, Sir Terwin hight, that well himselfe advaunst In all affayres, and was both bold and free, But not so happy as mote happy bee: He lov’d, as was his lot, a Lady gent, That him againe lov’d in the least degree:3 For she was proud, and of too high intent, And joyd to see her lover languish and lament.

28

“From whom retourning sad and comfortlesse, As on the way together we did fare, We met that villen (God from him me blesse) That cursed wight, from whom I scapt whyleare,4 A man of hell, that calls himselfe Despayre: Who first us greets; and after fayre areedes Of tydinges straunge, and of adventures rare: So creeping close, as Snake in hidden weedes, Inquireth of our states, and of our knightly deedes.

29

“Which when he knew, and felt our feeble harts Embost with bale,5 and bitter byting griefe, Which love had launched with his deadly darts,

1

nathemore: not for all this. I.e., if divine grace had not snatched me out of there, I would have shared the usual fate of those who are in that place.

2

3

I.e., that reciprocated his love only a little. whyleare: a little while ago. 5 Embost with bale: stricken with psychological pain. A hunting metaphor: the 4

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With wounding words and termes of foule repriefe, He pluckt from us all hope of due reliefe, That earst us held in love of lingring life; Then hopelesse hartlesse, gan the cunning thiefe Perswade us dye, to stint1 all further strife: To me he lent this rope, to him a rusty knife. 30

“With which sad instrument of hasty death, That wofull lover, loathing lenger light, A wyde way made to let forth living breath. But I more fearefull, or more lucky wight, Dismayd with that deformed dismall sight, Fledd fast away, halfe dead with dying feare; Ne yet assur’d of life by you, Sir knight, Whose like infirmity like chaunce may beare:2 But God you never let his charmed speaches heare.”3

31

“How may a man” (said he) “with idle speach Be wonne, to spoyle the Castle of his health?” “I wote” (quoth he) “whom tryall late did teach, That like would not for all this worldes wealth:4 His subtile tong, like dropping honny, mealt’th5 Into the heart, and searcheth every vaine, That ere one be aware, by secret stealth His powre is reft,6 and weaknes doth remaine. O never Sir desire to try his guilefull traine.”

32

“Certes” (sayd he) “hence shall I never rest, Till I that treachours art have heard and tryde; And you Sir knight, whose name mote I request, Of grace do me unto his cabin guyde.” “I that hight7 Trevisan” (quoth he) “will ryde Against my liking backe, to doe you grace:

quarry is embossed when it is so tired that it is flecked with foam and sweat. 1 stint: stop. 2 I.e., you who have the same weaknesses that my friend and I had and so may also be persuaded to suicide. 3 I.e., may God keep you from ever hearing his magically persuasive speeches.

4

I.e., I know, because recent experience has taught me, I who would not go through that experience again for all the wealth in the world. 5 mealt’th: melts. 6 reft: snatched away. 7 hight: am called.

Canto Nine

145

But nor for gold nor glee will I abyde By you, when ye arrive in that same place; For lever had I die,1 then see his deadly face.” 33

Ere long they come, where that same wicked wight His dwelling has, low in an hollow cave, Far underneath a craggy clift ypight,2 Darke, dolefull, dreary, like a greedy grave, That still for carrion carcases doth crave: On top whereof ay dwelt the ghastly Owle, Shrieking his balefull note, which ever drave Far from that haunt all other chearefull fowle; And all about it wandring ghostes did wayle and howle.

34

And all about old stockes and stubs of trees, Whereon nor fruite, nor leafe was ever seene, Did hang upon the ragged rocky knees;3 On which had many wretches hanged beene, Whose carcases were scattred on the greene, And throwne about the cliffs. Arrived there, That bare-head knight for dread and dolefull teene,4 Would faine have fled, ne durst approchen neare, But th’other forst him staye, and comforted in feare.

35

That darkesome cave they enter, where they find That cursed man, low sitting on the ground, Musing full sadly in his sullein mind; His griesie5 lockes, long growen, and unbound, Disordred hong about his shoulders round, And hid his face; through which his hollow eyne Lookt deadly dull, and stared as astound; His raw-bone cheekes through penurie and pine,6 Were shronke into his jawes, as he did never dyne.

36

His garment nought but many ragged clouts, With thornes together pind and patched was, The which his naked sides he wrapt abouts; And him beside there lay upon the gras

1

lever had I die: I would rather die. ypight: placed. 3 knees: crags. 4 teene: sorrow. 2

5 griesie: grey, filthy, hideous, or all of the above. 6 Despaire didn’t eat much because he was penurious, i.e., frugal; as a result he has pined away, i.e., gotten thin.

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A dreary corse, whose life away did pas, All wallowd in his own yet luke-warme blood, That from his wound yet welled fresh alas; In which a rusty knife fast fixed stood, And made an open passage for the gushing flood. 37

Which piteous spectacle, approving trew The wofull tale, that Trevisan had told, When as the gentle Redcrosse knight did vew, With firie zeale he burnt in courage bold, Him to avenge, before his blood were cold, And to the villein sayd, “Thou damned wight, The authour of this fact,1 we here behold, What justice can but judge against thee right, With thine owne blood to price2 his blood, here shed in sight.”

38

“What franticke fit” (quoth he) “hath thus distraught Thee, foolish man, so rash a doome to give? What justice ever other judgement taught, But he should dye, who merites not to live? None els to death this man despayring drive, But his owne guiltie mind deserving death. Is then unjust to each his dew to give?3 Or let him dye, that loatheth living breath?4 Or let him die at ease, that liveth here uneath?5

1

fact: deed. price: pay for. 3 Despaire pretends that Sir Terwin committed suicide out of guilt over some past misdeeds, because that is the motive for suicide which he plans to instill in Redcrosse. Actually, Sir Terwin committed suicide out of despair at ever winning his lady love—as his story shows. Despaire’s small slip betrays his dishonesty, but Redcrosse does not seem to notice. 4 After this foretaste of a temptation yet to come, Despaire moves into his hedonistic argument for suicide, which is aided by lulling rhetoric. The hedonistic arguments are drawn from those of classical Stoics for accepting death and even helping it along when it comes. Despaire assumes for the moment, and Redcrosse does not contradict him, that death is sleep, the end of 2

consciousness—e.g., in stanza 40. Some of Despaire’s arguments, as well as Redcrosse’s and the ideal reader’s responses, can be found in the treatment of despair and suicide in Chaucer’s “Parson’s Tale,” in Montaigne’s essay “To Flee from Sensual Pleasures at the Price of Life,” and in Faustus’ speeches at the end of Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus. Despair and resulting suicide soon absorbed the interest of many writers: in Shakespeare there is Lucrece’s reasoning in “The Rape of Lucrece”; Hamlet’s famous soliloquy which begins, “To be or not to be,” along with Horatio’s intention to commit suicide at the end of that play; and the many suicides in his Roman plays. Other writers on this issue include John Donne in Biathanatos, and Robert Burton in The Anatomy of Melancholy. 5 uneath: ill at ease, or with difficulty. Opposite of “eath,” which means easy.

Canto Nine

39

“Who travailes by the wearie wandring way, To come unto his wished home in haste, And meetes a flood, that doth his passage stay, Is not great grace to helpe him over past, Or free his feet, that in the myre sticke fast? Most envious man, that grieves at neighbours good, And fond, that joyest in the woe thou hast, Why wilt not let him passe, that long hath stood Upon the bancke, yet wilt thy selfe not pas the flood?

40

“He there does now enjoy eternall rest And happy ease, which thou doest want and crave, And further from it daily wanderest: What if some little payne the passage have, That makes frayle flesh to feare the bitter wave? Is not short payne well borne, that bringes long ease, And layes the soule to sleepe in quiet grave? Sleepe after toyle, port after stormie seas, Ease after warre, death after life does greatly please.”

41

The knight much wondred at his suddeine wit, And sayd, “The terme of life is limited, Ne may a man prolong, nor shorten it; The souldier may not move from watchfull sted, Nor leave his stand, untill his Captaine bed.”1 “Who life did limit by almightie doome,” (Quoth he)2 “knowes best the termes established; And he, that points the Centonell his roome, Doth license him depart at sound of morning droome.3

42

“Is not his deed, what ever thing is donne, In heaven and earth? did not he all create, To die againe? all ends that was begonne. Their times in his eternall booke of fate Are written sure, and have their certein date. Who then can strive with strong necessitie,

1

Redcrosse cogently fends off Despaire’s hedonistic arguments for suicide (stanzas 39–41) by saying that God, not man, must decide when it is time for the individual to die, and by implication that he personally has had no wound, illness, or societal ver-

147

dict to indicate that now is the time for him to die. He echoes Cicero, De Senectute, 20.73, and perhaps Sidney, Old Arcadia, 294. 2 I.e., Despaire. 3 droome: drum.

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That holds the world in his still chaunging state, Or shunne the death ordaynd by destinie? When houre of death is come, let none aske whence, nor why.1 43

“The lenger life, I wote the greater sin,2 The greater sin, the greater punishment: All those great battels, which thou boasts to win, Through strife, and blood-shed, and avengement, Now praysd, hereafter deare thou shalt repent: For life must life, and blood must blood repay. Is not enough thy evill life forespent?3 For he, that once hath missed the right way, The further he doth goe, the further he doth stray.

44

“Then doe no further goe, no further stray, But here ly downe, and to thy rest betake, Th’ill to prevent, that life ensewen may.4 For what hath life, that may it loved make, And gives not rather cause it to forsake? Feare, sicknesse, age, losse, labour, sorrow, strife, Payne, hunger, cold, that makes the hart to quake; And ever fickle fortune rageth rife, All which, and thousands mo do make a loathsome life.5

45

“Thou wretched man, of death hast greatest need, If in true ballaunce thou wilt weigh thy state: For never knight, that dared warlike deed, More luckless dissaventures did amate:6 Witnes the dungeon deepe, wherein of late Thy life shutt up, for death so oft did call;

1 Despaire replies feebly that if you commit suicide, it will be God working through you, since God makes everything happen, but he does not answer Redcrosse’s objection. That they both refer to God but not the afterlife is consistent with Stoicism. 2 Without allowing Redcrosse to speak, Despaire moves into his second argument, the argument for moral despair (stanzas 43, 45–47); and this argument finally convinces Redcrosse.

3

forespent: already spent. that life ensewen may: that may ensue in the rest of your life. 5 Despaire resumes the hedonistic argument (stanzas 44–45), this time by derogating life; again, it would be valid if Redcrosse were already dying of some other cause and if, as is declared in 47.9, there is no afterlife. 6 amate: frustrate, frighten. 4

Canto Nine

149

And though good lucke prolonged hath thy date,1 Yet death then, would the like mishaps forestall, Into the which hereafter thou maist happen fall. 46

“Why then doest thou, O man of sin, desire To draw thy dayes forth to their last degree? Is not the measure of thy sinfull hire High heaped up with huge iniquitee, Against the day of wrath,2 to burden thee? Is not enough, that to this Lady mild Thou falsest hast thy faith with perjuree, And sold thy selfe to serve Duessa vild, With whom in al abuse thou hast thy selfe defild?

47

“Is not he just, that all this doth behold From highest heven, and beares an equall3 eie? Shall he thy sins up in his knowledge fold, And guilty be of thine impietie?4 Is not his lawe, Let every sinner die: Die shall all flesh? what then must needs be donne, Is it not better to doe willinglie, Then linger, till the glas be all out ronne? Death is the end of woes: die soone, O faries sonne.”5

48

The knight was much enmoved with his speach, That as a swords poynt through his hart did perse, And in his conscience made a secrete breach, Well knowing true all, that he did reherse,

1

I.e., postponed your destined death-day thus far. 2 day of wrath: Doomsday. 3 equall: impartial. 4 Despaire’s rhetorical question implies the answer “No,” but a fully Christian answer would be “Yes,” in the sense that God in Christ assumed and expiated mankind’s guilt. This indicates that Despaire is employing half-truths; he is emphasizing one side, the negative side, of the Gospel message, God’s justice, and omitting the positive side, God’s mercy, as Una indicates in stanza 53.

5

The moral arguments for suicide: in stanza 43, the longer you live, the more you will sin; in stanza 46, you have sinned flagrantly already and deserve to go to hell. In stanza 46, Despaire admits that there is an afterlife, but here he says that “Death is the end of woes.” Cf. stanza 49, which contradictorily says that the afterlife will be unpleasant for Redcrosse given his infidelity to Una. This would seem to make a case against suicide and to favor staying alive as long as possible, but Despaire manages to twist the implications to his purpose.

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And to his fresh remembraunce did reverse,1 The ugly vew of his deformed crimes, That all his manly powres it did disperse, As he were charmed with inchaunted rimes, That oftentimes he quakt, and fainted oftentimes. 49

In which amazement, when the Miscreaunt Perceived him to waver weake and fraile, Whiles trembling horror did his conscience daunt, And hellish anguish did his soule assaile, To drive him to despaire, and quite to quaile, He shewd him painted in a table2 plaine, The damned ghosts, that doe in torments waile, And thousand feends that doe them endlesse paine With fire and brimstone, which for ever shall remaine.

50

The sight whereof so throughly him dismaid, That nought but death before his eies he saw, And ever burning wrath before him laid, By righteous sentence of th’Almighties law:3 Then gan the villein him to overcraw,4 And brought unto him swords, ropes, poison, fire, And all that might him to perdition draw; And bad him choose, what death he would desire: For death was dew to him, that had provokt Gods ire.

51

But whenas none of them he saw him take, He to him a dagger sharpe and keene, And gave it him in hand: his hand did quake, And tremble like a leafe of Aspin greene, And troubled blood through his pale face was seene To come, and goe with tidings from the heart, As it a ronning messenger had beene. At last resolv’d to worke his finall smart, He lifted up his hand, that backe againe did start.5

1

reverse: recall. table: picture. 3 Despaire manages to attract Redcrosse to the punishments of hell by the fact that Redcrosse has deserved them and by the ar2

gument that he should cooperate with God and become his own executioner. 4 overcraw: crow over, exult over. 5 that backe againe did start: that, out of an instinct for self-preservation, refused to make the stabbing motion Redcrosse desired.

Canto Nine

52

Which whenas Una saw, through every vaine The crudled cold ran to her well of life,1 As in a swowne: but soone reliv’d2 againe, Out of his hand she snatcht the cursed knife, And threw it to the ground, enraged rife, And to him said, “Fie fie, faint hearted knight, What meanest thou by this reprochfull strife? Is this the battaile, which thou vauntst to fight With that fire-mouthed Dragon, horrible and bright?3

53

“Come, come away, fraile, feeble, fleshly wight, Ne let vaine words bewitch thy manly hart, Ne divelish thoughts dismay thy constant spright. In heavenly mercies hast thou not a part?4 Why shouldst thou then despeire, that chosen art?5 Where justice growes, there grows eke greter grace, The which doth quench the brond of hellish smart, And that accurst hand-writing doth deface.6 Arise, Sir knight arise, and leave this cursed place.”

54

So up he rose, and thence amounted streight. Which when the carle7 beheld, and saw his guest Would safe depart, for all his subtile sleight, He chose an halter from among the rest, And with it hong him selfe, unbid8 unblest. But death he could not worke himselfe thereby; For thousand times he so him selfe had drest, Yet nathelesse it could not doe him die, Till he should die his last, that is eternally.

1

I.e., a chill of bloodcurdling horror gripped her heart. 2 reliv’d: brought back to life. 3 With psychological insight, Una first physically grabs the dagger, then appeals to Redcrosse’s ambition. Only then does she enter upon the theological refutation of Despaire’s moral argument for suicide. 4 I.e., will not God have mercy on you? Christian doctrine would add, “provided you repent,” and Redcrosse has already taken the first step in that direction and admitted his guilt (48.4–6). 5 Una invokes predestination, a doctrine common to all Christians but emphasized

151

by Calvinists; see also “chosen” in x.57. Besides God, only the individual can know, and that only in some branches of Protestantism, that he is chosen or predestinated for heaven; this suggests that Una here represents the Holy Spirit within Redcrosse, bearing “witnesse with our spirit, that we are the children of God” (Rom. 8.16). 6 deface: blot, i.e., erase, the justice of the old law that Despaire invoked—a paraphrase of Col. 2.14. It is now satisfied and made irrelevant by the mercy of Christ. 7 carle: a large, crude, low-class fellow. 8 unbid: without anyone urging him to.

Canto Ten Her faithfull knight faire Una brings To house of Holinesse, Where he is taught repentaunce, and The way to hevenly blesse.

1

What man is he, that boasts of fleshly might, And vaine assuraunce of mortality, Which all so soone, as it doth come to fight, Against spirituall foes,1 yields by and by, Or from the fielde most cowardly doth fly? Ne let the man ascribe it to his skill, That thorough grace hath gained victory. If any strength we have, it is to ill, But all the good is Gods, both power and eke will.2

2

1

By that, which lately hapned, Una saw, That this her knight was feeble, and too faint; And all his sinewes woxen weake and raw,3 Through long enprisonment, and hard constraint, Which he endured in his late restraint, That yet he was unfitt for bloody fight:

In Redcrosse’s case, Orgoglio and Despaire. 2 See Una’s teaching in ix.53: a person is not saved by works, but by God’s grace in response to faith and prayer. Both statements are extremely Protestant, i.e., Calvinistic. The rest of the canto, however, with a few exceptions, is surprisingly Catholic, in that the individual has to do many things in order to merit heaven. There are many biblical analogues to x.1, esp. in the Pauline epistles, esp. Phil. 2.13: “it is God which worketh in you, bothe the wil and the dede.” For Spenserian examples

of the “man” (line 1) who makes this error, see Redcrosse’s boast: “Vertue gives her self light, through darkenesse for to wade” (i.12.9); the description of Orgoglio discussed above (vii.9–10); Arthur’s dismissal of the “arme of fleshly might” in ix.11.6. On the other hand, cf. II.i.33, which gives some role to the individual’s will. This stanza resembles Articles of Religion of the Church of England (known as The 39 Articles, available in most older editions of The Book of Common Prayer), Articles 11 and 12. 3 raw: unfit.

152

Canto Ten

153

Therefore to cherish him with diets daint,1 She cast to bring him, where he chearen2 might, Till he recovered had his late decayed plight.3 3

There was an auncient house not far away,4 Renowmd throughout the world for sacred lore, And pure unspotted life: so well they say It governd was, and guided evermore, Through wisedome of a matrone grave and hore;5 Whose onely joy was to relieve the needes Of wretched soules, and helpe the helpelesse pore: All night she spent in bidding of her bedes,6 And all the day in doing good and godly deedes.

4

Dame Caelia7 men did her call, as thought From heaven to come, or thether to arise, The mother of three daughters, well upbrought In goodly thewes,8 and godly exercise: The eldest two most sober, chast, and wise, Fidelia and Speranza virgins were, Though spousd, yet wanting wedlocks solemnize; But faire Charissa to a lovely fere9 Was lincked, and by him had many pledges dere.10

1 daint: dainty; last syllable omitted for the sake of the rhyme. 2 chearen: in the modern sense of “cheer up” and also in the older sense of “become healthy.” 3 I.e., had gotten over his recently decayed health. 4 The closest overall analogue to the House of Holiness is the illustrated description of two French religious processions, the King’s and the Queen’s, which took place in Paris in 1583 and 1584. Among many similarities, the Queen’s ended at a real charitable institution called “The House of Love.” See Yates, 174–91, 197–207; she makes the connection between all this and Spenser’s House of Holiness on pp. 181–2. Plates showing contemporary drawings of these two processions are numbered 24 to 39. 5 hore: hoary, gray with age; adjective.

6 bedes: the rosary. Cf. Archimago’s (i.30) and Corceca’s (iii.13–14) uses of the rosary, which are satirized, presumably because the recital takes up too much of their time and because the prayers are counted on the beads, implying that the prayers are viewed as meritorious in themselves. Caelia does not divulge her numbers; her rosary seems just an aid to concentration, and she divides her time between saying the rosary and “doing good and godly deeds”—a balance of action and contemplation. See ACH note. 7 Caelia: heavenly. 8 thewes: manners, distinguished here from religious good deeds. 9 fere: mate, here presumably Christ. 10 Faith, Hope, and Charity or Love are the three theological virtues; see 1 Cor. 13.13. The rest of the House of Holiness evinces

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5

Arrived there, the dore they find fast lockt; For it was warely watched night and day, For feare of many foes: but when they knockt, The Porter opened unto them straight way: He was an aged syre, all hory gray, With lookes full lowly cast, and gate full slow, Wont on a staffe his feeble steps to stay, Hight Humiltá. They passe in stouping low; For streight and narrow was the way,1 which he did shew.

6

Each goodly thing is hardest to begin, But entred in a spatious court they see, Both plaine, and pleasaunt to be walked in, Where them does meete a francklin2 faire and free, And entertaines with comely courteous glee, His name was Zele, that him right well became, For in his speaches and behaveour hee Did labour lively to expresse the same, And gladly did them guide, till to the Hall they came.

7

There fayrely them receives a gentle Squyre, Of myld demeanure, and rare courtesee, Right cleanly clad in comely sad attire; In word and deede that shewd great modestee, And knew his good3 to all of each degree, Hight Reverence. He them with speaches meet Does faire entreat; no courting nicetee, But simple trew, and eke unfained sweet, As might become a Squyre so great persons to greet.

8

And afterwardes them to his Dame he leades, That aged Dame, the Lady of the place: Who all this while was busy at her beades:

agreement with this verse that “the chiefest of these is love.” Faith and esp. Hope are merely “spousd”—i.e., engaged—“to a lovely fere,” presumably to Christ, because they, and esp. Hope, look to the future in heaven. Charity is already married to him and has borne many children, often featured in visual portrayals of her, because

while she too will be fulfilled in heaven, she also works in this world. 1 See Matt. 7.14. 2

francklin: wealthy, non-noble landowner. his good: what was good to say to various types of comers.

3

Canto Ten

155

Which doen, she up arose with seemely grace, And toward them full matronely did pace. Where when that fairest Una she beheld, Whom well she knew to spring from hevenly race, Her heart with joy unwonted inly sweld, As feeling wondrous comfort in her weaker eld.1 9

And her embracing said, “O happy earth, Whereon thy innocent feet doe ever tread, Most vertuous virgin borne of hevenly berth, That to redeeme thy woefull parents head, From tyrans rage, and ever-dying dread, Hast wandred through the world now long a day; Yett ceassest not thy weary soles2 to lead, What grace hath thee now hether brought this way? Or doen thy feeble feet unweeting hether stray?

10

Strange thing it is an errant knight3 to see Here in this place, or any other wight, That hether turnes his steps. So few there bee, That chose the narrow path, or seeke the right: All keepe the broad high way, and take delight With many rather for to goe astray, And be partakers of their evill plight, Then with a few to walke the rightest way; O foolish men, why hast ye to your owne decay?”

11

“Thy selfe to see, and tyred limbes to rest, O matrone sage” (quoth she) “I hether came, And this good knight his way with me addrest,4 Ledd with thy prayses and broad-blazed fame, That up to heven is blowne.” The auncient Dame, Him goodly greeted in her modest guyse, And enterteynd them both, as best became, With all the court’sies, that she could devyse, Ne wanted ought, to shew her bounteous or wise.

1

eld: old age. soles: soles of feet or shoes, with a pun on “souls,” i.e., converts such as Redcrosse. The line pictures Truth wandering the earth throughout history along with her few converts.

2

3

errant knight: a knight on a quest, wandering. Could carry some moral ambiguity. 4 addrest: directed.

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12

Thus as they gan of sondrie thinges devise,1 Loe two most goodly virgins came in place, Ylinked arme in arme in lovely wise, With countenance demure, and modest grace, They numbred even steps and equall pace: Of which the eldest, that Fidelia hight, Like sunny beames threw from her Christall face, That could have dazd the rash beholders sight, And round about her head did shine like hevens light.

13

She was araied all in lilly white,2 And in her right hand bore a cup of gold, With wine and water fild up to the hight, In which a Serpent did himselfe enfold, That horrour made to all, that did behold;3 But she no whitt did change her constant mood: And in her other hand she fast did hold A booke that was both signd and seald with blood, Wherein darke things were writt, hard to be understood.4

14

Her younger Sister, that Speranza hight, Was clad in blew,5 that her beseemed well; Not all so chearefull seemed she of sight, As was her sister; whether dread did dwell, Or anguish in her hart, is hard to tell: Upon her arme a silver anchor6 lay, Whereon she leaned ever, as befell: And ever up to heven, as she did pray, Her stedfast eyes were bent, ne swarved other way.

1

devise: can mean talk. The traditional color of faith. 3 The golden cup is a traditional attribute of faith, symbolizing the Eucharistic cup, as Spenser’s wine and water makes clear. Cf. Duessa’s golden cup, which causes “Death and despeyre” (viii.14). On the distinction between good and bad cups, see 1 Cor. 10.21 and ACH note. The serpent in the cup recalls the serpent of Num. 21.8–9, the healing property of which, when it was raised on a pole and gazed upon, Christ compares to his own when he shall be crucified ( John 3.14). The cup and serpent 2

cause “horrour,” one’s emotion on considering that God died and we eat him—a salvific horror. 4 The Bible. The New Testament is particularly “signd and seald” with the blood of Christ, but the Old Testament will soon be said to be written “With bloody letters” (53.7) and so must be included as well. See Peter on Paul’s epistles: “among the which some things are hard to be understood” (2 Pet. 3.16). 5 Blue, traditional color of hope. 6 The anchor is the traditional emblem of hope. Hope includes anxiety as faith does not.

Canto Ten

15

They seeing Una, towardes her gan wend, Who them encounters with like courtesee; Many kind speeches they betweene them spend, And greatly joy each other for to see: Then to the knight with shamefast1 modestie They turne them selves, at Unaes meeke request, And him salute with well beseeming glee; Who faire them quites,2 as him beseemed best, And goodly gan discourse of many a noble gest.3

16

Then Una thus: “But she your sister deare, The deare Charissa where is she become? Or wants she health, or busie is elswhere?” “Ah no,” said they, “but forth she may not come: For she of late is lightned of her wombe, And hath encreast the world with one sonne more, That her to see should be but troublesome.” “Indeed” (quoth she) “that should her trouble sore, But thankt be God, and her encrease so evermore.”

17

Then saide the aged Caelia, “Deare dame, And you good Sir, I wote4 that of your toyle, And labors long, through which ye hether came, Ye both forwearied5 be: therefore a whyle I read you rest, and to your bowres recoyle.” Then called she a Groome, that forth him ledd Into a goodly lodge, and gan despoile6 Of puissant armes, and laid in easie bedd; His name was meeke Obedience rightfully aredd.

18

Now when their wearie limbes with kindly rest, And bodies were refresht with dew repast, Fayre Una gan Fidelia fayre request, To have her knight into her schoolehous plaste, That of her heavenly learning he might taste, And heare the wisedom of her wordes divine.

1

shamefast: in a weak sense, and hence favorable: humble and chaste. 2 quites: replies in the same vein. 3 gest: deed of arms.

157

4 wote: know; sometimes spelled “wot”; similar to “weet(e)” and “wit.” 5 forwearied: very wearied. 6 despoile: undress, disrobe.

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She graunted, and that knight so much agraste,1 That she him taught celestiall discipline, And opened his dull eyes, that light mote in them shine. 19

And that her sacred Booke, with blood ywritt, That none could reade, except she did them teach, She unto him disclosed every whitt, And heavenly documents thereout did preach, That weaker witt of man could never reach, Of God, of grace, of justice, of free will,2 That wonder was to heare her goodly speach: For she was hable, with her wordes to kill, And rayse againe to life the hart, that she did thrill.3

20

And when she list poure out her larger spright, She would commaund the hasty Sunne to stay, Or backward turne his course from hevens hight, Sometimes great hostes of men she could dismay, [Dry-shod to passe, she parts the flouds in tway;]4 And eke huge mountaines from their native seat She would commaund, themselves to beare away, And throw in raging sea with roaring threat. Almightie God her gave such powre, and puissaunce great.5

21

The faithfull knight now grew in litle space, By hearing her, and by her sisters lore, To such perfection of all hevenly grace; That wretched world he gan for to abhore, And mortal life gan loath, as thing forlore,6

1

agraste: agraced, showed favor to. Fidelia teaches fundamental doctrinal topics for intellectual assent. Spenser does not say what Fidelia taught about any of them, much less about free will. This line is a chiasmus: grace and justice are opposed and complementary forces in salvation, as we saw in the preceding canto, and God and free will are opposed and complementary forces in good deeds, as we are seeing in this canto. 3 thrill: pierce, but also with some of its modern meaning. 2

4

In 1590 line 5 was missing, yielding an eight-line stanza; I have therefore put it in brackets. It was added only in 1609, ten years after Spenser’s death, yet it sounds Spenserian. 5 Fidelia’s abilities illustrate the fides miraculorum, “the faith of miracles.” For analogues to these miraculous feats, see the following: for line 2, Josh. 10.12–3; for line 3, 2 Kings 20.10; for line 4, Judg. 7.19–22; for line 5, Exod. 14.21–31, and the present canto 53.2–5; for lines 6–8, Matt. 21.21. 6 forlore: abandoned, here in a good sense.

Canto Ten

159

Greevd with remembrance of his wicked wayes, And prickt with anguish of his sinnes so sore, That he desirde, to end his wretched dayes: So much the dart of sinfull guilt the soule dismayes.1 22

But wise Speranza gave him comfort sweet, And taught him how to take assured hold Upon her silver anchor, as was meet; Els had his sinnes so great, and manifold Made him forget all, that Fidelia told. In this distressed doubtfull agony, When him his dearest Una did behold, Disdeining life, desiring leave to dye, She found her selfe assayld with great perplexity.

23

And came to Caelia to declare her smart, Who well acquainted with that commune plight, Which sinfull horror workes in wounded hart, Her wisely comforted all, that she might, With goodly counsell and advisement right; And streightway sent with carefull diligence, To fetch a Leach,2 the which had great insight In that disease of grieved conscience, And well could cure the same; His name was Patience.

24

Who comming to that sowle-diseased knight,3 Could hardly him intreat, to tell his grief: Which knowne, and all that noyd his heavie spright, Well searcht, eftsoones he gan apply relief, Of salves and med’cines, which had passing prief,4 And there to added wordes of wondrous might:

1

Again, as with Despaire, Redcrosse is moved by guilt to commit suicide. Here it is the result of Fidelia’s presumably truthful teachings. On the former occasion, Una stepped in to prevent suicide (ix.53); this time, Speranza does. To grasp the anchor of hope might symbolize those arguments that Una used on the previous occasion—God’s mercy and his intention for Redcrosse to go to heaven.

2

Leach: doctor. Catholics would expect Penance in this role, but he occurs only later and in a subordinate role as disciplinarian. 3 Patience initiates some but not all of the traditional steps in repentance, utilized chiefly by Catholics: confession, illustrated in stanza 24; amendment; and satisfaction, reparation, or paying God back by suffering, illustrated in stanzas 26–8. 4 had passing prief: had been thoroughly tested.

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By which to ease he him recured brief, And much aswag’d the passion of his plight, That he his paine endur’d, as seeming now more light. 25

But yet, the cause and root of all his ill, Inward corruption, and infected sin, Not purg’d nor heald, behind remained still, And festring sore did ranckle yett within, Close creeping twixt the marow and the skin. Which to extirpe,1 he laid him privily Downe in a darksome lowly place far in, Whereas he meant his corrosives2 to apply, And with straight diet3 tame his stubborne malady.

26

In ashes and sackcloth he did array His daintie corse, proud humors to abate, And dieted with fasting every day,4 The swelling of his woundes to mitigate, And made him pray both earely and eke late: And ever as superfluous flesh did rott Amendment readie still at hand did wayt, To pluck it out with pincers fyrie whott,5 That soone in him was lefte no one corrupted jott.

27

And bitter Penaunce with an yron whip, Was wont him once to disple6 every day: And sharpe Remorse his hart did prick and nip, That drops of blood thence like a well did play; And sad Repentance used to embay,7 His blamefull body in salt water sore, The filthy blottes of sin to wash away. So in short space they did to health restore The man that would not live, but erst lay at deathes dore.

1

5

2

6

extirpe: extirpate. corrosives: “meter requires ‘corsives’. . . . The term signifies both a corrosive drug and a caustic remedy” (ACH). 3 straight diet: strict, restricted lifestyle. 4 Redcrosse’s mortification resembles Corceca’s (iii.14.3), except that his is for specific sins, for a limited time, and for a psychological effect.

whott: hot. disple: to subject to bodily punishment, esp. as a religious practice (OED). Flagellation was a Catholic practice, and one so ancient that it was seldom employed even by them in Spenser’s time, but see the hints of flagellation in Yates’s account of penitential confraternities (176 and 197). 7 embay: bathe.

Canto Ten

28

In which his torment often was so great, That like a Lyon he would cry and rore, And rend his flesh, and his owne synewes eat. His owne deare Una hearing evermore His ruefull shriekes and gronings, often tore Her guiltlesse garments, and her golden heare, For pitty of his payne and anguish sore; Yet all with patience wisely she did beare; For well she wist, his cryme could els be never cleare.1

29

Whom thus recover’d by wise Patience, And trew Repentaunce they to Una brought; Who joyous of his cured conscience, Him dearely kist, and fayrely eke besought Himselfe to chearish, and consuming thought To put away out of his carefull brest. By this Charissa, late in child-bed brought, Was woxen strong, and left her fruitfull nest; To her fayre Una brought this unacquainted guest.

30

She was a woman in her freshest age, Of wondrous beauty, and of bounty2 rare, With goodly grace and comely personage, That was on earth not easie to compare; Full of great love, but Cupids wanton snare As hell she hated, chaste in worke and will;3 Her necke and brests were ever open bare, That ay thereof her babes might sucke their fill; The rest was all in yellow robes arayed still.

31

A multitude of babes about her hong, Playing their sportes, that joyd her to behold, Whom still she fed, whiles they were weak and young, But thrust them forth still, as they wexed old: And on her head she wore a tyre4 of gold, Adornd with gemmes and owches5 wondrous fayre,

1

A clear indication that his suffering is meant not just as therapy but as reparation or restitution, part of the Catholic sacrament of penance. 2 bounty: not just generosity, but goodness in general.

161

3 The sanctified love between Redcrosse and Una, though it has a physical component, is never ascribed to Cupid. Arthur’s love for Gloriana is (Proem 3.3; ix.8.9). 4 tyre: here a headdress. 5 owches: ornaments.

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Whose passing price uneath was to be told; And by her syde there sate a gentle payre Of turtle doves, she sitting in an yvory chayre.1 32

The knight and Una entring, fayre her greet, And bid her joy of that her happy brood; Who them requites with court’sies seeming meet, And entertaynes with friendly chearefull mood. Then Una her besought, to be so good, As in her vertuous rules to schoole her knight, Now after all his torment well withstood, In that sad2 house of Penaunce, where his spright Had past the paines of hell, and long enduring night.

33

She was right joyious of her just request, And taking by the hand that Faeries sonne, Gan him instruct in everie good behest, Of love, and righteousnes, and well to donne, And wrath, and hatred warely to shonne,3 That drew on men Gods hatred,4 and his wrath, And many soules in dolours had fordonne:5 In which when him she well instructed hath, From thence to heaven she teacheth him the ready path.6

34

Wherein his weaker wandring steps to guyde, An auncient matrone she to her does call, Whose sober lookes her wisedome well descryde:7 Her name was Mercy, well knowne over all, To be both gratious, and eke liberall: To whom the carefull charge of him she gave, To leade aright, that he should never fall In all his waies through this wide worldes wave, That Mercy in the end his righteous soule might save.

1

Charissa’s attributes are traditional except for her unexplained yellow clothes (Charity’s clothes are usually red or rose colored) and her turtle doves, which are attributes of Venus. 2 sad: solemn. 3 warely to shonne: warily to shun.

4

I.e., hatred can send one to hell, implying that its opposite, love, can get one to heaven—an Augustinian doctrine. 5 I.e., had ruined in the pains (of hell). 6 The first unequivocal statement that Charity, not Faith, gets one into heaven; see 51.3 about Mercy. 7 descryde: allowed to be descried, manifested.

Canto Ten

35

The godly Matrone by the hand him beares Forth from her presence, by a narrow way, Scattred with bushy thornes, and ragged breares, Which still before him she remov’d away, That nothing might his ready passage stay: And ever when his feet encombred were, Or gan to shrinke, or from the right to stray, She held him fast, and firmely did upbeare, As carefull Nourse her child from falling oft does reare.

36

Eftsoones unto an holy Hospitall, That was fore by the way, she did him bring, In which seven Bead-men1 that had vowed all Their life to service of high heavens king Did spend their daies in doing godly thing: There gates to all were open evermore, That by the wearie way were traveiling, And one sate wayting ever them before, To call in commers by, that needy were and pore.

37

The first of them that eldest was, and best, Of all the house had charge and governement, As Guardian and Steward of the rest: His office was to give entertainement And lodging, unto all that came, and went: Not unto such, as could him feast againe, And double quite,2 for that he on them spent, But such, as want of harbour3 did constraine: Those for Gods sake his dewty was to entertaine.

1

The seven Bead-men in this good society personify the Seven Corporal Works of Mercy or the Seven Good Deeds, balancing in a general way the Seven Deadly Sins in the bad society, the House of Pride (Canto Four). For the first six, see Matt. 25.35–6; for the burial of the dead and the care of widows and orphans, see James 1.27. Besides appearing in multitudinous medieval and Catholic sources, visual and written, including the two processions discussed by Yates (174–91, 197–207), these seven ap-

163

peared, says TPR, in the Protestant Heinrich Bullinger’s Decades, translated as Fiftie godlie sermons. The name “Bead(s)-men” implies that they spend their lives praying (whether on rosary beads or otherwise), but these men are active. Apparently Spenser called them by this seemingly inappropriate name to indicate that, like Caelia, they have a contemplative side to them, which they, like Caelia, exercise at night. 2 quite: requite, repay. 3 harbour: place to live.

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38

The second was as Almner1 of the place, His office was, the hungry for to feed, And thrifty give to drinke, a worke of grace: He feard not once him selfe to be in need, Ne car’d to hoord for those, whom he did breede:2 The grace of God he layd up still in store, Which as a stocke he left unto his seede; He had enough, what need him care for more? And had he lesse, yet some he would give to the pore.

39

The third had of their wardrobe custody, In which were not rich tyres,3 nor garments gay, The plumes of pride, and winges of vanity, But clothes meet to keepe keene cold away, And naked nature seemely to aray; With which bare wretched wights he dayly clad, The images of God in earthly clay; And if that no spare clothes to give he had, His owne cote he would cut, and it distribute glad.

40

The fourth appointed by his office was, Poore prisoners to relieve with gratious ayd, And captives to redeeme with price of bras,4 From Turkes and Sarazins, which them had stayd;5 And though they faulty were, yet well he wayd, That God to us forgiveth every howre Much more then that, why they in bands were layd, And he that harrowd hell6 with heavie stowre, The faulty soules from thence brought to his heavenly bowre.

41

The fift had charge sick persons to attend, And comfort those, in point of death which lay; For them most needeth comfort in the end,

1

Almner: distributor of alms. whom he did breede: his children. Evidently this beads-man is married—a Protestant touch. 3 tyres: attire. 4 price of bras: brass coins. 5 stayd: detained in prison, arrested. 6 The Apostle’s Creed says, on the basis of hints in scripture, that Christ “descended 2

into hell.” The Gospel of Nicodemus elaborates these hints into a story of Christ descending into hell and fighting devils to rescue virtuous persons who could not have known him because they lived before him. This explicit reference confirms interpretations of Arthur (Canto Eight) and Redcrosse (Canto Eleven) as reenacting this rescue.

Canto Ten

165

When sin, and hell, and death doe most dismay The feeble soule departing hence away. All is but lost, that living we bestow,1 If not well ended at our dying day. O man have mind of that last bitter throw;2 For as the tree does fall, so lyes it ever low. 42

The sixt had charge of them now being dead, In seemely sort their corses to engrave,3 And deck with dainty flowres their brydall bed, That to their heavenly spouse4 both sweet and brave They might appeare, when he their soules shall save. The wondrous workmanship of Gods owne mould, Whose face he made, all beastes to feare, and gave All in his hand, even dead we honour should. Ah dearest God me graunt, I dead be not defould.

43

The seventh now after death and buriall done, Had charge the tender Orphans of the dead And wydowes ayd, least they should be undone: In face of judgement he their right would plead, Ne ought the powre of mighty men did dread In their defence, nor would for gold or fee Be wonne their rightfull causes downe to tread: And when they stood in most necessitee, He did supply their want, and gave them ever free.5

44

There when the Elfin knight arrived was, The first and chiefest of the seven, whose care Was guests to welcome, towardes him did pas: Where seeing Mercie, that his steps upbare,

1

bestow: give to charity, which in itself is a meritorious act; but it won’t get one to heaven if one falls into mortal sin on one’s death bed—a Catholic emphasis. 2 throw: throe, i.e., the agony of death. 3 engrave: put into the grave. 4 Picturing the soul’s entry into heaven as a marriage with Christ, and fancifully picturing her entering with her body and her material accoutrements. The next reason given

is doctrinally serious: to honor God’s image in and special creation of mankind; see Gen. 1.26–7. 5 free: freely. Redcrosse and Guyon together perform the last four of the seven works of mercy, Redcrosse’s being release of prisoners (Canto Eleven), and Guyon’s comforting the dying, burying the dead, and caring for widows and orphans (II.i.35–ii.11).

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And alwaies led, to her with reverence rare He humbly louted1 in meeke lowlinesse, And seemely welcome for her did prepare: For of their order she was Patronesse, Albe Charissa were their chiefest founderesse.2 45

There she awhile him stayes, him selfe to rest, That to the rest more hable3 he might bee: During which time, in every good behest And godly worke of Almes and charitee Shee him instructed with great industree; Shortly therein so perfect he became, That from the first unto the last degree, His mortall life he learned had to frame In holy righteousnesse, without rebuke or blame.

46

Thence forward by that painfull way they pas, Forth to an hill, that was both steepe and hy; On top whereof a sacred chappell was, And eke a litle Hermitage thereby. Wherein an aged holy man did lie, That day and night said his devotion, Ne other worldly busines did apply; His name was hevenly Contemplation; Of God and goodnes was his meditation.

47

Great grace that old man to him given had; For God he often saw from heavens hight, All4 were his earthly eien both blunt and bad, And through great age had lost their kindly sight, Yet wondrous quick and persaunt5 was his spright, As Eagles eie, that can behold the Sunne: That hill they scale with all their powre and might, That his6 fraile thighes nigh weary, and fordonne Gan faile, but by her helpe the top at last he wonne.

1

louted: bowed. Charity founded the hospital of the beadsmen, and Mercy, Charity’s outward expression, is her deputy. 3 hable: able. 4 All: although. 2

5

persaunt: piercing. The bestiaries tell us that only the eagle can look straight at the sun, which makes him an emblem of contemplation as well as of St. John, whose gospel emphasizes Christ’s divine side. 6 I.e., Redcrosse’s.

Canto Ten

48

Where they doe finde that godly aged Sire, With snowy lockes adowne his shoulders shed, As hoary frost with spangles doth attire The mossy branches of an Oke halfe ded. Each bone might through his body well be red, And every sinew seene through his long fast: For nought he car’d his carcas long unfed; His mind was full of spirituall repast, And pyn’d1 his flesh, to keepe his body low and chast.

49

Who when these two approching he aspide, At their first presence grew agrieved sore, That forst him lay his hevenly thoughts aside; And had he not that Dame respected more, Whom highly he did reverence and adore, He would not once have moved for the knight. They him saluted standing far afore; Who well them greeting, humbly did requight, And asked, to what end they clomb2 that tedious hight.

50

“What end” (quoth she) “should cause us take such paine, But that same end, which every living wight Should make his marke,3 high heaven to attaine? Is not from hence the way, that leadeth right To that most glorious house, that glistreth bright With burning starres, and everliving fire, Whereof the keies are to thy hand behight4 By wise Fidelia? shee doth thee require, To shew it to this knight, according his desire.”

51

“Thrise happy man, said then the father grave, Whose staggering steps thy steady hand doth lead, And shewes the way, his sinfull soule to save.5 Who better can the way to heaven aread, Then thou thy selfe, that was both borne and bred In hevenly throne, where thousand Angels shine?

1

pyn’d: starved. clomb: climbed. 3 marke: goal. 4 behight: designated. 2

5

167

This passage and 33.9 state unequivocally that human works of mercy get one into heaven; many other passages either imply it while equivocating on God’s mercy (34.9) or state a compromise, that they earn grace (38).

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Thou doest the praiers of the righteous sead1 Present before the majesty divine, And his avenging wrath to clemency incline. 52

“Yet since thou bidst, thy pleasure shalbe donne. Then come thou man of earth,2 and see the way, That never yet was seene of Faries sonne,3 That never leads the traveiler astray, But after labors long, and sad delay, Bring them to joyous rest and endlesse blis. But first thou must a season fast and pray, Till from her bands the spright assoiled4 is, And have her strength recur’d5 from fraile infirmitis.”

53

That done, he leads him to the highest Mount; Such one, as that same mighty man of God,6 That blood-red billowes like a walled front On either side disparted with his rod, Till that his army dry-foot through them yod,7 Dwelt forty daies upon; where writt in stone With bloody letters by the hand of God, The bitter doome of death and balefull mone He did receive, whiles flashing fire about him shone.8

54

Or like that sacred hill, whose head full hie, Adornd with fruitfull Olives all arownd, Is, as it were for endlesse memory Of that deare Lord, who oft theron was fownd,

1

sead: seed, as in the expression “the seed of Abraham”; offspring. See Night’s grumbling about how God favors “the sonnes of day” (v.25.7). 2 Etymologizing Redcrosse’s name, George, from Ge (Greek for earth), which the Hermit knows and will soon tell him. 3 Elves and Fairies (except for Guyon) cannot see or go to heaven; only humans can. 4 assoiled: absolved, in the technical, theological sense, with an etymological pun on “cleaned from soil.” 5 recur’d: a combination of cured and recovered.

6

Moses. yod: went; past tense of “yede,” go; also spelled “yode”—an archaism. 8 The Ten Commandments were written in stone. They are pictured as threatening because, according to Protestants, no one could fulfill them, so their penalties were unavoidable. See also the identification of law with punishment in Despaire’s arguments. In Scripture, the letters were not literally bloody, as here; Spenser’s imagery opens the door to seeing Fidelia’s book as the entire Bible. 7

Canto Ten

169

For ever with a flowring girlond crownd:1 Or like that pleasaunt Mount, that is for ay Through famous Poets verse each where renownd, On which the thrise three learned Ladies play Their hevenly notes, and make full many a lovely lay.2 55

From thence, far off he unto him did shew A litle path, that was both steepe and long, Which to a goodly Citty led his vew; Whose wals and towres were builded high and strong Of perle and precious stone, that earthly tong Cannot describe, nor wit of man can tell; Too high a ditty3 for my simple song: The Citty of the greate king hight it well, Wherein eternall peace and happinesse doth dwell.

56

As he thereon stood gazing, he might see The blessed Angels to and fro descend4 From highest heven, in gladsome companee, And with great joy into that Citty wend, As commonly as frend does with his frend. Whereat he wondred much, and gan enquere, What stately building durst so high extend Her lofty towres unto the starry sphere, And what unknowen nation there empeopled5 were.

57

“Faire knight” (quoth he) “Hierusalem that is, The new Hierusalem, that God has built For those to dwell in, that are chosen his, His chosen people purg’d from sinful guilt, With piteous blood, which cruelly was spilt

1 The flowering garland is from the Garden of Gethsemane, which was on the Mount of Olives (Matt. 26.30, 36). 2 The pleasant mount is Parnassus, where the nine Muses dwell; the three mountains correspond to the three epochs of Nature (Parnassus), Law (Sinai), and Grace (Mount of Olives). Cf. the simile of the Well of Life to springs that are of the Old Testament, of the New Testament, or contemporary (xi.30). The triad implies an equality, per-

haps as forms of vision, between Parnassus and the scriptural mountains. See ACH note ad loc; and Phillips. 3 ditty: subject; the topos of authorial modesty again, perhaps justified in dealing with a theological subject. 4 From Jacob’s dream of angels ascending and descending between earth and heaven (Gen. 28.12). 5 empeopled: installed as citizens.

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On cursed tree, of that unspotted lam, That for the sinnes of al the world was kilt: Now are they Saints all in that Citty sam,1 More dear unto their God, then younglings to their dam.”2 58

“Till now,” said then the knight, “I weened well, That great Cleopolis, where I have beene, In which that fairest Fary Queene doth dwell The fairest Citty was, that might be seene; And that bright towre all built of christall clene, Panthea,3 seemd the brightest thing, that was: But now by proofe all otherwise I weene; For this great Citty that does far surpas, And this bright Angels towre quite dims that towre of glas.”

59

“Most trew,” then said the holy aged man; “Yet is Cleopolis for earthly frame, The fairest peece, that eie beholden can: And well beseemes all knights of noble name, That covet in th’immortall booke of fame To be eternized, that same to haunt,4 And doen their service to that soveraigne Dame, That glory does to them for guerdon graunt: For she is hevenly borne, and heaven may justly vaunt.5

60

“And thou faire ymp, sprong out from English race, How ever now accompted6 Elfins sonne, Well worthy doest thy service for her grace,

1

sam: together. Spenser here reverts to Protestantism again and says that one gets to heaven by God’s arbitrary choice and by forgiveness through the blood of Christ. Perhaps this represents the view from the perspective of eternity. Christ as the sacrificial “Lamb of God” (John 1.29) harmonizes with the image in line 9 of all the saints as lambs. 3 Derives from the Pantheon in Rome, which is a temple dedicated to all the gods—presumably here a temple to those 2

who achieved earthly fame; perhaps an analogue of Westminster Abbey. 4 that same to haunt: to hang around Cleopolis, to frequent it. 5 The longest description of Cleopolis (fame-city), the Faerie capital, and Gloriana that we ever get in the poem as we have it. Spenser says of Gloriana, with less justification than of Una, that she is heavenly born; he equivocates on “glory”—heavenly or earthly?—in order to assimilate fame to salvation. 6 accompted: counted as, assumed to be.

Canto Ten

171

To aide a virgin desolate foredonne. But when thou famous victory hast wonne, And high emongst all knights hast hong thy shield, Thenceforth the suitt1 of earthly conquest shonne, And wash thy hands from guilt of bloody field: For blood can nought but sin, and wars but sorrows yield. 61

“Then seek this path, that I to thee presage, Which after all to heaven shall thee send; Then peaceably thy painefull pilgrimage To yonder same Hierusalem doe bend, Where is for thee ordaind a blessed end: For thou emongst those Saints, whom thou doest see, Shalt be a Saint, and thine owne nations frend And Patrone: thou Saint George shalt called bee, Saint George of mery England, the signe of victoree.”2

62

“Unworthy wretch” (quoth he) “of so great grace, How dare I thinke such glory to attaine?” “These that have it attaynd, were in like cace As wretched men, and lived in like paine.” “But deeds of armes must I at last be faine,3 And Ladies love to leave so dearely bought?” “What need of armes, where peace doth ay remaine,” (Said he) “and bitter battailes all are fought? As for loose loves they’are vaine, and vanish into nought.”4

1

suitt: pursuit. Although Protestants had officially downgraded all saints, and both Protestants and Catholics alike doubted St. George’s historical existence, he was immensely popular in England and had been for centuries. He was the patron saint of the royal Order of the Garter. The standard source is the Legenda aurea, or Golden Legend, of Jacobus de Voragine, a collection of saint’s-lives, translated and published by Caxton in 1483 (TPR). Here and only here—i.e., in slaying the dragon to save the princess and her lamb (and, by implication, when he is in heaven being invoked by the English warriors)—does Redcrosse become like St. George. Their careers are otherwise quite

2

different, e.g., St. George is not interested in marrying the princess. As indicated above, Redcrosse could not have seen the New Jerusalem or become a Saint if he were truly an Elf. 3 faine: content to leave. 4 ACH outlines the difficult part of the debate thusly: Redcrosse’s second question (5–6) has two parts: “Must I abandon arms and must I abandon love?” The first is parried by a double rhetorical question (7–8), and the second dismissed with a reproof (9), namely that loves vanish—presumably because “in the resurrection they nether marie wives, nor wives are bestowed in marriage” (Matt. 22.30).

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63

“O let me not” (quoth he) “then turne againe Backe to the world, whose joyes so fruitlesse are, But let me heare for aie in peace remaine, Or straight way on that last long voyage fare, That nothing may my present hope empare.”1 “That may not be” (said he) “ne maist thou yitt Forgoe that royal maides bequeathed care, Who did her cause into thy hand committ, Till from her cursed foe thou have her freely quitt.”

64

“Then shall I soone,” (quoth he) “so God me grace, Abett that virgins cause disconsolate, And shortly back returne unto this place, To walke this way in Pilgrims poore estate.2 But now aread, old father, why of late Didst thou behight3 me borne of English blood, Whom all a Fairies sonne doen nominate?”4 “That word shall I” (said he) “avouchen good, Sith to thee is unknowne the cradle of thy brood.

65

“For well I wote, thou springst from ancient race Of Saxon kinges, that have with mightie hand And many bloody battailes fought in place High reard their royall throne in Britans land And vanquisht them, unable to withstand: From thence a Faery thee unweeting reft,5 There as thou slepst in tender swadling band, And her base Elfin brood there for thee left. Such men do Chaungelings call, so chaungd by Faeries theft.

66

“Thence she thee brought into this Faery lond, And in an heaped furrow did thee hyde, Where thee a Ploughman all unweeting fond,

1

empare: impair. In Canto Twelve, Redcrosse reveals another reason why he cannot go to heaven now, the same as his reason for deferral of marriage to Una (an event that comes to seem like the equivalent of heaven)—his duty to Gloriana. Christians often are reluctant to go back to the world after a mystical experience and see their time on earth as a

2

pointless deferral of heaven. The Hermit curiously motivates him to do so by the pursuit of fame, which reinforces his duty to Gloriana (see stanza 59). 3 behight: call. 4 nominate: denominate. 5 reft: snatched away, took away violently; past tense of “reave.”

Canto Ten

173

As he his toylesome teme that way did guyde, And brought thee up in ploughmans state to byde,1 Whereof Georgos he thee gave to name;2 Till prickt with courage, and thy forces pryde, To Fary court thou cam’st to seeke for fame, And prove thy puissaunt armes, as seemes thee best became.”3 67

“O holy Sire” (quoth he) “how shall I quight4 The many favours I with thee have fownd, That hast my name and nation redd aright, And taught the way that does to heaven bownd?” This saide, adowne he looked to the grownd, To have returnd, but dazed were his eyne, Through passing brightnes, which did quite confound His feeble sence, and too exceeding shyne. So darke are earthly thinges compard to things divine.

68

At last whenas himselfe he gan to fynd, To Una back he cast him to retyre; Who him awaited still with pensive mynd. Great thankes and goodly meed5 to that good syre, He thens departing gave for his paynes hyre. So came to Una, who him joyd to see, And after litle rest, gan him desyre, Of her adventure myndfull for to bee. So leave they take of Caelia, and her daughters three.

1

byde: remain. ACH quotes directly from Barclay’s early modern translation of The Golden Legend: “George is sayd of geos which is as moche to saye as erthe and orge that is tilyenge so george is to say as tilyenge the erthe that is his flesshe,” etc., with other etymologies.

2

3 Once again, the Hermit affirms worldly values. Apparently fame can be renounced only after it has been won. 4 quight: requite. 5 meed: money or other worldly goods as recompense.

Canto Eleven The knight with that old Dragon1 fights two dayes incessantly: The third him overthrowes, and gayns most glorious victory.

1

High time now gan it wex for Una fayre, To thinke of those her captive Parents deare, And their forwasted kingdom to repayre: Whereto whenas they now approched neare, With hartie wordes her knight she gan to cheare, And in her modest maner thus bespake; “Deare knight, as deare, as ever knight was deare, That all these sorrowes suffer for my sake, High heven behold the tedious toyle, ye for me take.

2

“Now are we come unto my native soyle, And to the place, where all our perilles dwell; Here hauntes that feend, and does his dayly spoyle, Therefore henceforth bee at your keeping well,2 And ever ready for your foeman fell. The sparke of noble corage now awake, And strive your excellent selfe to excell; That shall ye evermore renowmed make, Above all knights on earth, that batteill undertake.”

3

And pointing forth, “lo yonder is” (said she) “The brasen towre in which my parents deare For dread of that huge feend emprisond be Whom I from far, see on the walles appeare Whose sight my feeble soule doth greatly cheare: And on the top of all I do espye The watchman wayting tydings glad to heare, That O my parents might I happily Unto you bring, to ease you of your misery.”3

1 Citing Rev. 20.2: “the dragon that old serpent, which is the devil and Satan.”

2

I.e., be on your guard. In 1590, this entire stanza was missing; see Textual Notes. 3

174

Canto Eleven

4

With that they heard a roaring hideous sownd, That all the ayre with terror filled wyde, And seemd uneath1 to shake the stedfast ground. Eftsoones that dreadfull Dragon they espyde, Where stretcht he lay upon the sunny side, Of a great hill, himselfe like a great hill. But all so soone, as he from far descryde Those glistring armes, that heven with light did fill, He rousd himselfe full blyth, and hastned them untill.2

5

Then badd the knight his Lady yede3 aloof, And to an hill her selfe withdraw asyde, From whence she might behold that battailles proof And eke be safe from daunger far descryde: She him obayd, and turnd a litle wyde,4 Now O thou sacred Muse, most learned Dame,5 Fayre ympe of Phoebus and his aged bryde,6 The Nourse of time, and everlasting fame, That warlike handes ennoblest with immortall name;

6

O gently come into my feeble brest, Come gently, but not with that mightie rage, Wherewith the martiall troupes thou doest infest, And hartes of great Heroes doest enrage, That nought their kindled corage may aswage, Soone as thy dreadfull trompe begins to sownd;

1

uneath: almost; see ACH note ad loc. I.e., he raised himself most blithely and hastened unto them—like an eager host. 3 yede: go—an archaism. 4 wyde: off to one side. 5 Spenser frequently calls his muse sacred. TPR identifies this one as Calliope, Muse of epic poetry; M&P identify her as Clio, Muse of history; ACH remains undecided. Clio is invoked at III.iii.4, and both Clio and Calliope at VII.vi.37. It is a long-standing problem in Spenser criticism. Perhaps he did not mean to be specific. 2

175

6 Spenser’s Muse is “Faiyre ympe of Phoebus,” following Natalis Comes, whose quotation from Metamorphoses (1.516–17) seems to make Phoebus Apollo the father of the Muses (Mythologiae, 4.10), not Jove, as in Hesiod (Theogony, 56–62), and indeed even as in The Faerie Queene, IV.xi.10, VII.vi.37, VII.vii.1 (TPR; M&P; Roche 1989, 162–6; SE “Muse”). The Muse’s mother is Phoebus’ “aged bride” Mnemosyne, goddess of memory, pictured as old, and mother of the Muses by all accounts. 1590 has a comma after “Phoebus,” which I delete in order to obviate the implication that the Muse is also the aged bride of Phoebus.

176

The Faerie Queene: Book One

The God of warre with his fiers equipage1 Thou doest awake, sleepe never he so sownd, And scared nations doest with horror sterne astownd. 7

Fayre Goddesse lay that furious fitt2 asyde, Till I of warres and bloody Mars doe sing,3 And Bryton fieldes with Sarazin blood bedyde, Twixt that great faery Queene and Paynim king, That with their horror heven and earth did ring, A worke of labour long, and endlesse prayse: But now a while lett downe that haughtie string,4 And to my tunes thy second tenor rayse,5 That I this man of God his godly armes may blaze.6

8

By this the dreadfull Beast drew nigh to hand, Halfe flying, and halfe footing in his haste, That with his largenesse measured much land, And made wide shadow under his huge waste;7 As mountaine doth the valley overcaste. Approching nigh, he reared high afore

1

equipage: equipment. fitt: mood. 3 Possibly an allusion to Spenser’s intended epic “of politicke virtues in [Arthur’s] person, after that hee came to be king” (“Letter to Raleigh”), or to the projected Book Twelve of the present poem. Later Redcrosse reveals his promise to serve in what sounds like this same final, climactic battle “Gainst that proud Paynim king, that works her teene” (xii.18.8). See ACH for the critical debate. 2

4

haughtie string: lofty strain. Spenser calls for a lower mode, perhaps alluding to Plato’s notion that certain musical modes are appropriate for certain subjects and audiences. 5 With “second tenor,” Spenser inexplicably belittles the subject of this canto, a religious one (see Introduction, 4), in favor of that of the projected Book Twelve, presumably a secular one (though warring against Paynims was then considered a reli-

gious act). The invocation itself emphasizes the episode, even as the content deemphasizes it. However that may be, this invocation represents a valuable foreshadowing of how the poem would have ended had Spenser lived to complete it; it would have resembled Arthur’s conquest of Rome in the “Arthur and Lucius” section of Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur in which the Paynim King would allegorize the Pope, and it would have lent to the poem a nowmissing epic dimension. Nevertheless, in the poem as we have it, the dragon fight receives the longest treatment of any battle (55 stanzas), so it does not take second place to anything. 6 blaze: proclaim. Like Proem 1.5–9, this is a rewriting of Aeneid’s “Arma virumque cano,” “I sing of arms and the man.” Here Spenser claims to sing of “his godly armes” rather than of the man (ACH). 7 waste: waist, synecdoche for his entire torso.

Canto Eleven

177

His body monstrous, horrible, and vaste, Which to increase his wondrous greatnes more, Was swoln with wrath, and poyson, and with bloody gore. 9

And over, all with brasen scales was armd, Like plated cote of steele, so couched neare, That nought mote perce, ne might his corse bee harmd With dint of swerd, nor push of pointed speare, Which as an Eagle, seeing pray appeare, His aery plumes doth rouze, full rudely dight,1 So shaked he, that horror was to heare, For as the clashing of an Armor bright, Such noyse his rouzed scales did send unto the knight.

10

His flaggy winges when forth he did display, Were like two sayles, in which the hollow wynd Is gathered full, and worketh speedy way: And eke the pennes, that did his pineons2 bynd, Were like mayne-yardes, with flying canvas lynd, With which whenas him list the ayre to beat, And there by force unwonted passage fynd, The clowdes before him fledd for terror great, And all the hevens stood still amazed with his threat.

11

His huge long tayle wownd up in hundred foldes, Does overspred his long bras-scaly back, Whose wreathed boughtes3 when ever he unfoldes, And thick entangled knots adown does slack, Bespotted as with shieldes of red and blacke, It sweepeth all the land behind him farre, And of three furlongs does but litle lacke; And at the point two stinges in fixed arre, Both deadly sharp, that sharpest steele exceeden farr.

12

But stinges and sharpest steele did far exceed4 The sharpnesse of his cruel rending clawes; Dead was it sure, as sure as death in deed,

1

full rudely dight: all ruffed out. pennes: feathers; pineons: in this context, wings (OED). 3 boughtes: coils. 2

4

steele did far exceed: direct object before subject; i.e., the sharpness of his cruel, rending claws did far exceed that of stings and sharpest steel.

The Faerie Queene: Book One

178

What ever thing does touch his ravenous pawes, Or what within his reach he ever drawes. But his most hideous head my tongue to tell, Does tremble: for his deepe devouring jawes Wyde gaped, like the griesly mouth of hell, Through which into his darke abysse all ravin1 fell. 13

And that2 more wondrous was, in either jaw Three ranckes of yron teeth enraunged were, In which yett trickling blood and gobbets raw Of late devoured bodies did appeare, That sight thereof bredd cold congealed feare: Which to increase, and all atonce to kill, A cloud of smoothering smoke and sulphure seare3 Out of his stinking gorge forth steemed still, That all the ayre about with smoke and stench did fill.

14

His blazing eyes, like two bright shining shieldes, Did burne with wrath, and sparkled living fyre; As two broad Beacons, sett in open fieldes, Send forth their flames far off to every shyre, And warning give, that enimies conspyre, With fire and sword the region to invade; So flam’d his eyne with rage and rancorous yre: But far within, as in a hollow glade, Those glaring lampes were sett, that made a dreadfull shade.

15

So dreadfully he towardes him did pas, Forelifting up a loft his speckled brest, And often bounding on the brused gras, As for great joyaunce of his newcome guest. Eftsoones he gan advaunce his haughty crest, As chauffed Bore his bristles doth upreare, And shoke his scales to battaile ready drest; That made the Redcrosse knight nigh quake for feare, As bidding bold defyaunce to his foeman neare.

1 2

ravin: prey. that: what.

3

seare: burning.

Canto Eleven

16

The knight gan fayrely couch1 his steady speare, And fiersely ran at him with rigorous might: The pointed steele arriving rudely theare, His harder hyde would nether perce, nor bight, But glauncing by foorth passed forward right; Yet sore amoved with so puissaunt push, The wrathfull beast about him turned light,2 And him so rudely passing by, did brush With his long tayle, that horse and man to ground did rush.

17

Both horse and man up lightly rose againe, And fresh encounter towardes him addrest: But th’ydle stroke yet backe recoyld in vaine, And found no place his deadly point to rest. Exceeding rage enflam’d the furious beast, To be avenged of so great despight;3 For never felt his imperceable brest So wondrous force, from hand of living wight; Yet had he prov’d4 the powre of many a puissant knight.

18

Then with his waving wings displayed wyde, Himselfe up high he lifted from the ground, And with strong flight did forcibly divyde The yielding ayre, which nigh too feeble found Her flitting parts,5 and element unsound, To beare so great a weight: he cutting way With his broad sayles, about him soared round: At last low stouping with unweldy sway, Snatcht up both horse and man, to beare them quite away.

19

Long he them bore above the subject6 plaine, So far as Ewghen7 bow a shaft may send, Till struggling strong did him at last constraine, To let them downe before his flightes end:

1

couch: bring down from its vertical position and lay horizontally in the rest. 2 about him turned light: either turned himself quickly about (as he would have to do to strike him with his tail) or turned quickly around Redcrosse. 3 despight: insult.

4

179

prov’d: tested by experience; synomous with approved. 5 flitting parts: moving particles. 6 subject: lying below, from the Latin word subicere. 7 Ewghen: made of yew.

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As hagard hauke1 presuming to contend With hardy fowle, above his hable might,2 His wearie pounces all in vaine doth spend, To trusse3 the pray too heavy for his flight; Which comming down to ground, does free it selfe by fight. 20

He so disseized of his gryping grosse,4 The knight his thrillant speare againe assayd In his bras-plated body to embosse,5 And three mens strength unto the stroake he layd; Wherewith the stiffe beame quaked, as affrayd, And glauncing from his scaly necke, did glyde Close under his left wing, then broad displayd. The percing steele there wrought a wound full wyde, That with the uncouth smart the Monster lowdly cryde.

21

He cryde, as raging seas are wont to rore, When wintry storme his wrathful wreck does threat, The rolling billowes beat the ragged shore, As they the earth would shoulder from her seat, And greedy gulfe does gape, as he would eat His neighbour element6 in his revenge: Then gin the blustring brethren7 boldly threat, To move the world from off his stedfast henge,8 And boystrous battaile make, each other to avenge.

22

The steely head stuck fast still in his flesh, Till with his cruell clawes he snatcht the wood, And quite a sunder broke. Forth flowed fresh A gushing river of blacke gory blood, That drowned all the land, whereon he stood; The streame thereof would drive a water-mill.

1 hagard hauke: a mature and wild hawk, in contrast to the young “Eyas hauke” (34.6) to which the knight is compared (ACH). 2

hable might: what he was able to lift. trusse: carry conveniently. 4 gryping grosse: heavy gripful (TPR; M&P). Syntax is unclear as to whether the 3

knight or the dragon motivates the release from the dragon’s grip. 5 embosse: plunge, encase; apparently coined by Spenser (OED). 6 neighbour element: earth. 7 blustring brethren: the winds. 8 henge: variant spelling of “hinge,” referring to the poles.

Canto Eleven

181

Trebly augmented was his furious mood With bitter sence of his deepe rooted ill, That flames of fire he threw forth from his large nosethril. 23

His hideous tayle then hurled he about, And therewith all enwrapt the nimble thyes Of his froth-fomy steed, whose courage stout Striving to loose the knott, that fast him tyes, Himselfe in streighter bandes too rash implyes,1 That to the ground he is perforce constraynd To throw his ryder: who can2 quickly ryse From off the earth, with durty blood distaynd,3 For that reprochfull fall right fowly he disdaynd.

24

And fercely tooke his trenchand4 blade in hand, With which he stroke so furious and so fell, That nothing seemd the puissaunce could withstand: Upon his crest the hardned yron fell, But his more hardned crest was armd so well, That deeper dint therein it would not make; Yet so extremely did the buffe him quell, That from thenceforth he shund the like to take, But when he saw them come, he did them still forsake.5

25

The knight was wroth to see his stroke beguyld, And smot againe with more outrageous might; But backe againe the sparcling steele recoyld, And left not any marke, where it did light; As if in Adamant rocke it had beene pight,6 The beast impatient of his smarting wound, And of so fierce and forcible despight, Thought with his winges to stye7 above the ground; But his late wounded wing unserviceable found.

26

Then full of griefe and anguish vehement, He lowdly brayd, that like was never heard, And from his wide devouring oven sent

1

5

2

6

implyes: entangles. can: did. 3 distaynd: stained. 4 trenchand: sharp.

forsake: get out of the way of. Adamant: a mythical substance proverbial for its hardness; pight: securely placed. 7 stye: ascend.

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A flake of fire,1 that flashing in his beard, Him all amazd, and almost made afeard: The scorching flame sore swinged2 all his face, And through his armour all his body seard, That he could not endure so cruell cace, But thought his armes to leave, and helmet to unlace.3 27

Not that great Champion of the antique world,4 Whom famous Poetes verse so much doth vaunt, And hath for twelve huge labours high extold, So many furies and sharpe fits did haunt, When him the poysoned garment did enchaunt With Centaures blood, and bloody verses charmd, As did this knight twelve thousand dolours5 daunt, Whom fyrie steele now burnt, that erst him armd, That erst him goodly armd, now most of all him harmd.

28

Faynt, wearie, sore, emboyled, grieved, brent6 With heat, toyle, wounds, armes, smart, and inward fire7 That never man such mischiefes did torment; Death better were, death did he oft desire, But death will never come, when needes require. Whom so dismayd when that his foe beheld,

1 A flake of fire: a spark, symbolizing, according to Kaske (1969, 616–20), concupiscence in general and, in particular, temptation—the first stage or zero grade of sin; e.g., shrinking from pain. 2 swinged: singed. 3 In view of past experience (Canto Seven), this thought must be a sin. Worse still, “thought to” in Elizabethan English can mean not just “considered whether to” but “planned to” (OED, “think,” 7, 8). That Redcrosse should sink so low and that he stands in need of baptism (see below) indicate that he is underachieving on this first day and thus represents mankind in some darker period before Christianity, probably in the age of law. It could be argued that

the paradoxically harmful armor symbolizes law. 4 I.e., Hercules, who also suffered such agony that he committed suicide because he was burned by a magical garment (Metamorphoses, 9.152–272). 5 dolours: discomforts; from the Latin word dolor, meaning pain. 6 emboyled: boiled or seared within his armor; brent: variant form of burnt. 7 Versus correlativi, or parallel verses, in which each word in the first line has a word in the following line that appropriately matches it, e.g., faint . . . with heat, wearie . . . with toyle, etc. The frequent spondees express both pain and resistance to pain.

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183

He cast to suffer him no more respire, But gan his sturdy sterne about to weld,1 And him so strongly stroke, that to the ground him feld.2 29

It fortuned (as fayre it then befell,) Behynd his backe unweeting, where he stood, Of auncient time there was a springing well, From which fast trickled forth a silver flood, Full of great vertues, and for med’cine good. Whylome, before that cursed Dragon got That happy land, and all with innocent blood Defyld those sacred waves, it rightly hot3 The well of life,4 ne yet his vertues had forgot.

30

For unto life the dead it could restore, And guilt of sinfull crimes cleane wash away, Those that with sicknesse were infected sore, It could recure, and aged long decay Renew, as one were borne that very day. Both Silo this, and Jordan did excell, And th’English Bath, and eke the german Spau, Ne can Cephise, nor Hebrus match this well:5 Into the same the knight back overthrowen, fell.

31

Now gan the golden Phoebus for to steepe His fierie face in billowes of the west, And his faint steedes watred in Ocean deepe, Whiles from their journall6 labours they did rest, When that infernall Monster, having kest7 His wearie foe into that living well,

1

weld: wield, so spelled for the sake of the rhyme. 2 Being knocked down by the dragon or the devil symbolizes being overcome by sin, in this case probably the sin of deciding to take his armor off and whatever that may symbolize. 3 hot: past tense of hight, meaning “was called.” 4 See Rev. 22.1–2. Probably a symbol of baptism here, because of 36.2–4; cf. 46.9, 34.9, and 29.9. Probably the same as the

“living well” anticipated by Fradubio in ii.43. 5 There are six comparisons: two to biblical bodies of water, then two to contemporary, then two to classical; cf. the comparisons to Old-Testament, New-Testament, and classical mountains in x.53–54 and note. See Phillips. 6 journall: daily. 7 kest: cast; variant spelling for sake of rhyme.

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Can high advaunce his broad discoloured brest, Above his wonted pitch, with countenance fell, And clapt his yron wings, as victor he did dwell.1 32

Which when his pensive Lady saw from farre, Great woe and sorrow did her soule assay, As weening that the sad end of the warre, And gan to highest God entirely pray, That feared chaunce from her to turne away; With folded hands and knees full lowly bent All night shee watcht, ne once adowne would lay Her dainty limbs in her sad dreriment, But praying still did wake, and waking did lament.

33

The morrow next gan earely to appeare, That Titan2 rose to runne his daily race; But earely ere the morrow next gan reare Out of the sea faire Titans deawy face,3 Up rose the gentle virgin from her place, And looked all about, if she might spy Her loved knight to move his manly pace: For she had great doubt of his safety, Since late she saw him fall before his enimy.

34

At last she saw, where he upstarted brave Out of the well, wherein he drenched lay; As Eagle fresh out of the Ocean wave,4 Where he hath lefte his plumes all hory gray, And deckt himselfe with fethers youthly gay, Like Eyas5 hauke up mounts unto the skies, His newly budded pineons to assay, And merveiles at him selfe, stil as he flies:6 So new this new-borne knight to battell new did rise.7

1

dwell: remain. That Titan: when the sun. 3 Titan, the sun, rises out of the sea as does the renewed eagle (34.3) and the knight “Out of the well” (34.2; ACH). 4 See Ps. 103.5: “Thy youth is renewed like the egles.” “It was supposed that the eagle, when old, would fly into the sun, burn off his old feathers, and then dive into a pool to renew his youth” (TPR). 2

5

Eyas: young. I.e., and as he flies he keeps marveling at himself. 7 On this middle day of the battle, Redcrosse performs as a godly-baptized Christian ideally would, holding his own against the devil without and pieces of him within, and falling not because he has sinned (cf. xi.26), but out of physical weakness. 6

Canto Eleven

35

Whom when the damned feend so fresh did spy, No wonder, if he wondred at the sight, And doubted, whether his late enimy It were, or other new supplied knight. He, now to prove his late renewed might, High brandishing his bright deaw-burning blade, Upon his crested scalp so sore did smite, That to the scull a yawning wound it made: The deadly dint his dulled sences all dismaid.

36

I wote not, whether the revenging steele Were hardned with that holy water dew, Wherein he fell, or sharper edge did feele, Or his baptized hands now greater grew; Or other secret vertue did ensew; Els never could the force of fleshly arme, Ne molten mettall in his blood embrew:1 For till that stownd could never wight him harme, By subtilty, nor slight, nor might, nor mighty charme.

37

The cruell wound enraged him so sore, That loud he yelded2 for exceeding paine; As hundred ramping Lions seemd to rore, Whom ravenous hunger did thereto constraine: Then gan he tosse aloft his stretched traine, And therewith scourge the buxome3 aire so sore, That to his force to yielden it was faine; Ne ought his sturdy strokes might stand afore, That high trees overthrew, and rocks in peeces tore.

38

The same advauncing high above his head, With sharpe intended4 sting so rude him smott, That to the earth him drove, as stricken dead, Ne living wight would have him life behott:5 The mortall sting his angry needle shott Quite through his shield, and in his shoulder seasd,

1

embrew: plunge. yelded: yelled. 3 buxome: yielding. 2

4

185

intended: extended and aimed. I.e., no one in the world would have thought him to be alive. 5

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Where fast it stucke, ne would thereout be gott: The griefe thereof him wondrous sore diseasd, Ne might his rancling paine with patience be appeasd. 39

But yet more mindfull of his honour deare, Then of the grievous smart, which him did wring, From loathed soile he can him lightly reare, And strove to loose the far infixed sting: Which when in vaine he tryde with struggeling, Inflam’d with wrath, his raging blade he hefte,1 And strooke so strongly, that the knotty string Of his huge taile he quite a sonder clefte, Five joints2 thereof he hewd, and but the stump him lefte.

40

Hart cannot thinke, what outrage, and what cries, With fowle enfouldred3 smoake and flashing fire, The hell-bred beast threw forth unto the skies, That all was covered with darknesse dire: Then fraught with rancour, and engorged yre, He cast at once him to avenge for all, And gathering up himselfe out of the mire, With his uneven wings did fiercely fall, Upon his sunne-bright shield, and grypt it fast withall.

41

Much was the man encombred with his hold, In feare to lose his weapon in his paw, Ne wist yett, how his talaunts4 to unfold; Nor harder was from Cerberus5 greedy jaw To plucke a bone, then from his cruell claw To reave by strength, the griped gage6 away: Thrise he assayd it from his foote to draw, And thrise in vaine to draw it did assay, It booted nought to thinke, to robbe him of his pray.

1

hefte: past tense of “heave,” synonymous with heaved. 2 Symbolizing the five senses, the usual entry points of sin, and hence an outpost of the devil carried around by all mankind. See the five senses among the besiegers of Alma’s castle in II.xi.7–13.

3

enfouldred: “black as a thundercloud” (OED). 4 talaunts: talons. 5 Cerberus: the dog that guards the gate to hell. I.e., “it would be harder to pluck a bone from Cerberus’ jaw than. . .” 6 reave: snatch away; gage: pledge, prize.

Canto Eleven

42

Tho1 when he saw no power might prevaile, His trusty sword he cald to his last aid, Wherewith he fiersly did his foe assaile, And double blowes about him stoutly laid, That glauncing fire out of the yron plaid; As sparckles from the Andvile use to fly, When heavy hammers on the wedg are swaid;2 Therewith at last he forst him to unty One of his grasping feete, him to defend thereby.

43

The other foote, fast fixed on his shield, Whenas no strength, nor stroks mote him constraine To loose, ne yet the warlike pledg to yield, He smott thereat with all his might and maine, That nought so wondrous puissaunce might sustaine; Upon the joint the lucky steele did light, And made such way, that hewd it quite in twaine;3 The paw yett missed not his minisht4 might, But hong still on the shield, as it at first was pight.

44

For griefe thereof, and divelish despight, From his infernall fournace forth he threw Huge flames, that dimmed all the hevens light, Enrold in duskish smoke and brimstone blew; As burning Aetna from his boyling stew Doth belch out flames, and rockes in peeces broke, And ragged ribs of mountaines molten new, Enwrapt in coleblacke clowds and filthy smoke, That al the land with stench, and heven with horror choke.

45

The heate whereof, and harmefull pestilence So sore him noyd,5 that forst him to retire A litle backeward for his best defence, To save his body from the scorching fire, Which he from hellish entrailes did expire.

1

tho: then. swaid: swung and struck. 3 Heb. 4.12: “For the worde of God is . . . sharper then anie two edged sworde, and entreth through, even unto the dividing asonder . . . of the joynts.” Again, a piece of 2

187

the devil is lodged within the godly Everyman, and again he refuses to be controlled by it. 4 minisht: diminished, prefix omitted for sake of alliteration. 5 noyd: annoyed.

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It chaunst (eternall God that chaunce did guide) As he recoiled backeward, in the mire His nigh foreweried feeble feet did slide, And downe he fell, with dread of shame sore terrifide. 46

There grew a goodly tree him faire beside, Loaden with fruit and apples rosy redd, As they in pure vermilion had beene dide, Whereof great vertues over all were redd:1 For happy life to all, which thereon fedd, And life eke everlasting did befall: Great God it planted in that blessed stedd2 With his Almighty hand, and did it call The tree of life, the crime of our first fathers fall.3

47

In all the world like was not to be fownd, Save in that soile, where all good things did grow, And freely sprong out of the fruitfull grownd, As incorrupted Nature did them sow, Till that dredd Dragon all did overthrow. Another like faire tree4 eke grew thereby, Whereof who so did eat, eftsoones did know Both good and ill: O mournfull memory: That tree through one mans fault hath doen us all to dy.

48

From that first tree forth flowd, as from a well, A trickling streame of Balme, most soveraine And dainty deare, which on the ground still fell, And overflowed all the fertile plaine, As it had deawed bene with timely raine: Life and long health that gracious ointment gave, And deadly wounds could heale, and reare againe The sencelesse corse appointed for the grave.5 Into that same he fell: which did from death him save.

1 over all were redd: far and wide were known. 2 stedd: place, stead. 3 See Gen. 3.22. “Spenser is not suggesting that the tree of life is the cause of Adam’s fall” (TPR); rather, “it was a cause of reproach, or accusation (Lat. crimen), against Adam” (ACH); “his ‘crime’ is responsibility

for the consequent denial of this tree (mentioned again in Rev. 22.2) to all human kind” (M&P). It is a Latinate ellipsis. 4 The tree of knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2.17, 3.3–7, 11–3). 5 For the “Balme” and “ointment,” see Rev. 22.2 and 2 Esd. 2.12: “They shal have at wil the tre of life, smelling of ointement:

Canto Eleven

49

For nigh thereto the ever damned Beast Durst not approch, for he was deadly made, And al that life preserved, did detest: Yet he it oft adventur’d1 to invade. By this the drouping day-light gan to fade, And yield his rowme to sad succeeding night, Who with her sable mantle gan to shade The face of earth, and wayes of living wight, And high her burning torch set up in heaven bright.

50

When gentle Una saw the second fall Of her deare knight, who weary of long fight, And faint through losse of blood, moov’d not at all, But lay as in a dreame of deepe delight, Besmeard with pretious Balme, whose vertuous might Did heale his woundes, and scorching heat alay, Againe she stricken was with sore affright, And for his safetie gan devoutly pray; And watch the noyous2 night, and wait for joyous day.

51

The joyous day gan early to appeare, And fayre Aurora3 from the deawy bed Of aged Tithone gan her selfe to reare, With rosy cheekes, for shame as blushing red; Her golden locks for hast were loosely shed About her eares, when Una her did marke Clymbe to her charet,4 all with flowers spred; From heven high to chace the chearelesse darke; With mery note her lowd salutes the mounting larke.

they shall nether labour nor be weary.” In the indubitably apocryphal Gospel of Nicodemus, Seth is promised oil from the tree of life that will heal the dying Adam (for this and other sources, see ACH). Given its deifying effect (see Kaske 1969, 634–6), and given that the well symbolizes baptism, this tree probably symbolizes Holy Communion, but the resemblance is not close. Weatherby (26, 39–43, 169) interprets it as, among other things, the chrism or cross of oil applied right after baptism.

1

189

adventur’d: tried. noyous: harmful. 3 Goddess of the dawn. Aurora loved Tithonus and persuaded the gods to give him immortality, but she forgot to ask them to give him eternal youth as well, so he lived on but kept on getting older and older. 4 charet: chariot, cart. 2

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52

Then freshly up arose the doughty1 knight, All healed of his hurts and woundes wide, And did himselfe to battaile readie dight; Whose early foe awaiting him beside To have devourd, so soone as day he spyde, When now he saw himselfe so freshly reare, As if late fight had nought him damnifyde, He woxe dismaid, and gan his fate to feare; Nathlesse with wonted rage he him advaunced neare.

53

And in his first encounter, gaping wyde, He thought attonce him to have swallowd quight, And rusht upon him with outragious pryde; Who him rencountring fierce, as hauke in flight, Perforce rebutted backe. The weapon bright Taking advantage of his open jaw, Ran through his mouth with so importune might, That deepe emperst his darksom hollow maw, And back retyrd, his life blood forth with all did draw.2

54

So downe he fell, and forth his life did breath, That vanisht into smoke and cloudes swift; So downe he fell, that th’earth him underneath Did grone, as feeble so great load to lift; So downe he fell, as an huge rocky clift, Whose false3 foundacion waves have washt away, With dreadfull poyse4 is from the mayneland rift, And rolling downe, great Neptune5 doth dismay; So downe he fell, and like an heaped mountaine lay.6

1

doughty: formidable. At this point, according to most critics, Redrosse becomes or starts to symbolize Christ in his death and Harrowing of Hell; he suffers no setbacks and is instantly victorious; moreover, it is the dawn of the third day. 2 I.e., when the weapon pulled back, it drew forth the dragon’s life blood. 3 false: outwardly solid but internally fragile.

4

poyse: hovering, as if it were falling in slow motion, as in a film. 5 God of the sea. 6 Anaphora—beginning two or more phrases with the same word or words—a figure perhaps inspired by the twofold repetition, “It has fallen, it has fallen, Babylon” (Rev. 18.2). In each colon or member, one of the four elements is mentioned: air, earth, and water, excluding fire; fire he had once, but no longer.

Canto Eleven

55

1

The knight him selfe even trembled at his fall, So huge and horrible a masse it seemd; And his deare Lady, that beheld it all, Durst not approch for dread, which she misdeemd, But yet at last, whenas the direfull feend She saw not stirre, off-shaking1 vaine affright, She nigher drew, and saw that joyous end: Then God she praysd, and thankt her faithfull knight, That had atchievde so great a conquest by his might.2

off-shaking: forcing herself to shed. Antecedent of “his” hovers ambiguously between “knight” and “God” (see Introduction, 12), representing a problem for re-

2

191

ligious people: “If I do something good, is it I who deserve the credit, or God who worked through me?” Cf. II.i.33–34.

Canto Twelve Fayre Una to the Redcrosse knight betrouthed is with joy: Though false Duessa it to barre Her false sleightes doe imploy.

1

Behold I see the haven nigh at hand, To which I meane my wearie course to bend; Vere the maine shete, and beare up with1 the land, The which afore is fayrly to be kend,2 And seemeth safe from storms, that may offend; There this fayre virgin wearie of her way Must landed bee, now at her journeyes end: There eke my feeble barke3 a while may stay, Till mery wynd and weather call her thence away.

2

Scarsely had Phoebus in the glooming East Yett harnessed his fyrie-footed teeme, Ne reard above the earth his flaming creast,4 When the last deadly smoke aloft did steeme, That signe of last outbreathed life did seeme, Unto the watchman on the castle wall; Who thereby dead that balefull Beast did deeme, And to his Lord and Lady lowd gan call, To tell, how he had seene the Dragons fatall fall.

3

Uprose with hasty joy, and feeble speed That aged Syre, the Lord of all that land, And looked forth, to weet, if trew indeed Those tydinges were, as he did understand,

1

vere: let it out so that the sail holds less wind; beare up with: steer toward. 2 fayrly to be kend: seems fair. The image of writing a poem as sailing a ship occurs frequently in classical poetry: in Dante, in Chaucer, in Ariosto, and at the end of

this canto. See ACH note and SE, “Shipimagery.” 3 barke: boat. 4 This is the same dawn as that which precedes the defeat of the dragon, as described in xi.51.

192

Canto Twelve

193

Which whenas trew by tryall he out fond,1 He badd to open wyde his brasen gate, Which long time had beene shut, and out of hond2 Proclaymed joy and peace through all his state; For dead now was their foe, which them forrayed3 late. 4

Then gan triumphant Trompets sownd on hye, That sent to heven the ecchoed report Of their new joy, and happie victory Gainst him, that had them long opprest with tort,4 And fast imprisoned in sieged fort. Then all the people, as in solemne feast, To him assembled with one full consort, Rejoycing at the fall of that great beast, From whose eternall bondage now they were releast.

5

Forth came that auncient Lord and aged Queene, Arayd in antique robes downe to the grownd, And sad habiliments right well beseene;5 A noble crew about them waited rownd Of sage and sober Peres, all gravely gownd; Whom far before did march a goodly band Of tall young men, all hable armes to sownd,6 But now they laurell braunches bore in hand; Glad signe of victory and peace in all their land.

6

Unto that doughtie Conquerour they came, And him before themselves prostrating low, Their Lord and Patrone loud did him proclame, And at his feet their lawrell boughs did throw. Soone after them all dauncing on a row The comely virgins came, with girlands dight, As fresh as flowres in medow greene doe grow, When morning deaw upon their leaves doth light: And in their handes sweet Timbrels7 all upheld on hight.

1

by tryall he out fond: he found out by looking for himself. 2 out of hond: immediately. 3 forrayed: ravaged. 4 with tort: wrongfully. 5 sad: sober; well beseene: can mean ap-

propriate, which seems to befit the aged parents here, or attractive, as in xii.8.8. 6 armes to sownd: to wield weapons, alluding to the fact that knights clash their shields, making a sound; see iv.40.3 and xi.9.8 (ACH). 7 timbrels: tambourines.

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7

And them before, the fry1 of children yong Their wanton sportes and childish mirth did play, And to the Maydens sownding tymbrels song In well attuned notes, a joyous lay,2 And made delightfull musick all the way, Untill they came, where that faire virgin stood; As fayre Diana in fresh sommers day, Beholdes her Nymphes, enraung’d in shady wood, Some wrestle, some do run, some bathe in christall flood.3

8

So she beheld those maydens meriment With chearefull vew; who when to her they came, Themselves to ground with gracious humblesse bent And her ador’d by honorable name, Lifting to heven her everlasting fame: Then on her head they sett a girlond greene, And crowned her twixt earnest and twixt game; Who in her self-resemblance well beseene,4 Did seeme such, as she was, a goodly maiden Queene.

9

And after all the raskall many5 ran, Heaped together in rude rablement, To see the face of that victorious man: Whom all admired, as from heaven sent, And gazd upon with gaping wonderment, But when they came, where that dead Dragon lay, Stretcht on the ground in monstrous large extent, The sight with ydle feare did them dismay, Ne durst approach him nigh, to touch, or once assay.

10

Some feard, and fledd; some feard and well it faynd; One that would wiser seeme, then all the rest, Warnd him not touch, for yet perhaps remaynd Some lingring life within his hollow brest,

1

fry: crowd. lay: song. 3 Another use of classical images in a favorable sense—rare in Book One. The alexandrine expresses a panoramic view of Diana’s triathlon—a cinematographic moment. 4 I.e., with her leafy crown, attractively resembling what she really was, the heir of 2

the kingdom, as opposed to Duessa, who usually resembles someone else. 5 raskall many: the lower classes. This episode represents a comedy of social class. Also it restores the dragon’s size, which Spenser had shrunk during the battle to allow Redcrosse to reach the base of his wing (xi.20) and the top of his head (xi.24).

Canto Twelve

195

Or in his wombe might lurke some hidden nest Of many Dragonettes, his fruitfull seede; Another saide, that in his eyes did rest Yet sparckling fyre, and badd therof take heed; Another said, he saw him move his eyes indeed. 11

One mother, whenas her foolehardy chyld Did come to neare, and with his talants play Halfe dead through feare, her litle babe revyld, And to her gossibs1 gan in counsell say; “How can I tell, but that his talents may Yet scratch my sonne, or rend his tender hand.” So diversly them selves in vaine they fray; Whiles some more bold, to measure him nigh stand, To prove how many acres he did spred of land.2

12

Thus flocked all the folke him rownd about, The whiles that hoarie king, with all his traine,3 Being arrived, where that champion stout After his foes defeasaunce4 did remaine, Him goodly greetes, and fayre does entertayne, With princely gifts of yvory and gold, And thousand thankes him yeeldes for all his paine. Then when his daughter deare he does behold, Her dearely doth imbrace, and kisseth manifold.

13

And after to his Pallace he them bringes, With shaumes,5 and trompets, and with Clarions sweet; And all the way the joyous people singes, And with their garments strowes the paved street Whence mounting up, they fynd purveyaunce meet6 Of all, that royall Princes court became, And all the floore was underneath their feet Bespredd with costly scarlott of great name,7 On which they lowly sitt, and fitting purpose8 frame.

1

5

2

6

gossibs: women friends. The caesura-less alexandrine expresses the dragon’s length. 3 traine: retinue. 4 defeasaunce: defeat; unique in the poem; one suspects Spenser lengthened the word for the sake of the meter.

shaumes: oboes. purveyaunce meet: suitable living conditions. 7 scarlott of great name: scarlet cloth of high quality or price. 8 purpose: topic of conversation.

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14

What needes me tell their feast and goodly guize,1 In which was nothing riotous nor vaine? What needes of dainty dishes to devize,2 Of comely services, or courtly trayne?3 My narrow leaves cannot in them contayne The large discourse of roiall Princes state. Yet was their manner then but bare and playne: For th’antique world excesse and pryde did hate; Such proud luxurious pompe is swollen up but late.

15

Then when with meates and drinkes of every kinde Their fervent appetites they quenched had, That auncient Lord gan fit occasion finde, Of straunge adventures, and of perils sad, Which in his travell him befallen had, For to demaund of his renowmed guest: Who then with utt’rance grave, and count’nance sad, From poynt to poynt, as is before exprest, Discourst his voyage long, according his request.

16

Great pleasure mixt with pittifull regard, That godly King and Queene did passionate,4 Whyles they his pittifull adventures heard, That oft they did lament his lucklesse state, And often blame the too importune5 fate, That heapd on him so many wrathfull wreakes:6 For never gentle knight, as he of late, So tossed was in fortunes cruell freakes;7 And all the while salt teares bedeawd the hearers cheaks.

17

Then sayd that royall Pere in sober wise; “Deare Sonne, great beene the evils, which ye bore From first to last in your late enterprise, That I note,8 whether praise, or pitty more:

1

guize: behavior. This stanza is one of many indications that the world within the poem, while fallen, is as yet relatively uncorrupted—a silver age. 2 devize: talk; so also in 17.9, 18.2. 3 trayne: retinue. 4 passionate: if “King and Queene” is the subject, it means “express with feeling.” If

“Great pleasure . . .” is the subject, then it means “make passionate.” 5 importune: grievous, severe, assiduous. 6 wreakes: calamities, here apparently without the idea of vengeance. 7 freakes: here, whims. 8 note: don’t know; contraction of “ne wot.”

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For never living man, I weene, so sore In sea of deadly daungers was distrest; But since now safe ye seised1 have the shore, And well arrived are, (high God be blest) Let us devize of ease and everlasting rest.” 18

“Ah dearest Lord,” said then that doughty knight, “Of ease or rest I may not yet devize; For by the faith, which I to armes have plight, I bownden am streight after this emprize, As that your daughter can ye well advize, Backe to retourne to that great Faery Queene, And her to serve sixe yeares in warlike wize, Gainst that proud Paynim king, that works her teene:2 Therefore I ought crave pardon, till I there have beene.”3

19

“Unhappy falls that hard necessity,” (Quoth he) “the troubler of my happy peace, And vowed foe of my felicity; Ne I against the same can justly preace:4 But since that band ye cannot now release, Nor doen undoe; (for vowes may not be vayne) Soone as the terme of those six yeares shall cease, Ye then shall hether backe retourne agayne, The marriage to accomplish vowd betwixt you twayn.

20

“Which for my part I covet to performe, In sort as5 through the world I did proclame, That who so kild that monster most deforme, And him in hardy battayle overcame, Should have mine onely daughter to his Dame,6 And of my kingdome heyre apparaunt bee:

1

seised: reached. teene: sorrow. 3 This deferral of the wedding in order to serve Gloriana comes as a surprise to us as well as to Una’s family, though we received hints of it before (see ix.17.1–3) and apparently Una knew about it. Its duration of six years resembles the six years that Jacob was forced to serve to win Leah, his first wife, before he could marry Rachel, the 2

girl he really wanted. Medievals interpreted Leah as the active life and Rachel as the contemplative life, thus arguing the chronological priority of the active life; see Gen. 29.17–30. Gloriana is clearly an aspect of the active life and Una, as religious truth, is an aspect of the contemplative life. 4 preace: press. 5 In sort as: according to what. 6 to his Dame: for his wife.

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Therefore since now to thee perteynes the same, By dew desert of noble chevalree, Both daughter and eke kingdome, lo I yield to thee.”1 21

Then forth he called that his daughter fayre, The fairest Un’ his onely daughter deare, His onely daughter, and his only hayre; Who forth proceeding with sad sober cheare,2 As bright as doth the morning starre appeare Out of the East, with flaming lockes bedight, To tell that dawning day is drawing neare, And to the world does bring long wished light; So faire and fresh that Lady shewd her selfe in sight.

22

So faire and fresh, as freshest flowre in May; For she had layd her mournefull stole aside, And widow-like sad wimple3 throwne away, Wherewith her heavenly beautie she did hide, Whiles on her wearie journey she did ride; And on her now a garment she did weare, All lily white, withoutten spot, or pride,4 That seemd like silke and silver woven neare,5 But neither silke nor silver therein did appeare.

23

The blazing brightnesse of her beauties beame, And glorious light of her sunshyny face6 To tell, were as to strive against the streame. My ragged rimes are all too rude and bace, Her heavenly lineaments for to enchace.7 Ne wonder; for her own deare loved knight, All were she8 daily with himselfe in place, Did wonder much at her celestiall sight: Oft had he seene her faire, but never so faire dight.

1

A formulaic romance situation. sad sober cheare: serious, sober countenance. 3 wimple: veil. In her new gown, she symbolizes the spotless bride of the Lamb in Rev. 19.7–8, 21.2, and 11. Accordingly, Redcrosse now typifies Christ as the Bridegroom, the Lamb. 2

4

pride: ostentatious ornament. neare: closely. 6 Una’s brightness here links her to the Woman Clothed with the Sunne (Rev. 12.1), of whom she is sometimes seen as a type. 7 I.e., to be a setting for her lineaments. 8 all were she: although she was. 5

Canto Twelve

24

So fairely dight, when she in presence came, She to her Syre made humble reverence, And bowed low, that her right well became, And added grace unto her excellence: Who with great wisedome, and grave eloquence Thus gan to say. But eare he thus had sayd,1 With flying speede, and seeming great pretence, Came running in, much like a man dismayd, A Messenger with letters, which his message sayd.

25

All in the open hall amazed stood, At suddeinnesse of that unwary2 sight, And wondred at his breathlesse hasty mood. But he for nought would stay his passage right,3 Till fast4 before the king he did alight; Where falling flat, great humblesse he did make, And kist the ground, whereon his foot was pight; Then to his handes that writt he did betake, Which he disclosing, read thus, as the paper spake.5

26

“To thee, most mighty king of Eden fayre,6 Her greeting sends in these sad lines addrest, The wofull daughter, and forsaken heyre Of that great Emperour of all the West; And bids thee be advised for the best, Ere thou thy daughter linck in holy band Of wedlocke to that new unknowen guest: For he already plighted his right hand Unto another love, and to another land.

1

Anacoluthon, or breaking off in the middle of a sentence. As 36.6–7 makes clear, Una’s father is about to “bid” the banns of marriage when he is interrupted. 2 unwary: unexpected. 3 right: direct. 4 fast: close. 5 I.e., Archimago presents the letter to the king, who unfolds it and reads it aloud. Duessa’s letter exaggerates the seriousness of

199

her relationship with Redcrosse: though he did sleep with her—a fact that has apparently been concealed from Una’s parents up to now—Redcrosse never promised her anything; there was no altar, no betrothal, and no vow that we know of, and Duessa is not likely to have required one. See 32.9 and note. 6 This confirms our impression from vii.44 that Una’s parents symbolize, and in a sense are, Adam and Eve.

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27

“To me sad mayd, or rather widow sad, He was affyaunced long time before, And sacred pledges he both gave, and had, False erraunt knight, infamous, and forswore: Witnesse the burning Altars, which1 he swore, And guilty heavens of his bold perjury, Which though he hath polluted oft of yore, Yet I to them for judgement just doe fly, And them conjure t’avenge this shamefull injury.2

28

“Therefore since mine he is, or3 free or bond, Or false or trew, or living or else dead, Withhold, O soverayne Prince, your hasty hond From knitting league with him, I you aread; Ne weene my right with strength adowne to tread, Through weakenesse of my widowhed, or woe: For truth is strong, her rightfull cause to plead, And shall finde friends, if need requireth soe. So bids thee well to fare, Thy neither friend, nor foe, Fidessa.”

29

When he these bitter byting wordes had red, The tidings straunge did him abashed make, That still he sate long time astonished As in great muse, ne word to creature spake. At last his solemne silence thus he brake, With doubtfull eyes fast fixed on his guest; “Redoubted knight, that for myne only sake Thy life and honor late adventurest, Let nought be hid from me, that ought to be exprest.

30

“What meane these bloody vowes, and idle threats, Throwne out from womanish impatient mynd? What hevens? what altars? what enraged heates Here heaped up with termes of love unkynd, My conscience cleare with guilty bands would bynd? High God be witnesse, that I guiltlesse ame.

1

which: on which. I.e., I fly for just judgment to the altars and the heavens by which he swore (to marry me), although he has been untrue to 2

his vow before, and I entreat them to avenge this shameful injury. 3 or: whether.

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201

But if your selfe, Sir knight, ye faulty fynd, Or wrapped be in loves of former Dame, With cryme doe not it cover, but disclose the same.” 31

To whom the Redcrosse knight this answere sent, “My Lord, my king, be nought hereat dismayd, Till well ye wote by grave intendiment,1 What woman, and wherefore doth me upbrayd With breach of love, and loialty betrayd. It was in my mishaps, as hitherward I lately traveild, that unwares I strayd Out of my way, through perils straunge and hard; That day should faile me, ere I had them all declard.

32

“There did I find, or rather I was fownd Of this false woman, that Fidessa hight, Fidessa hight the falsest Dame on grownd, Most false Duessa, royall richly dight, That easy was t’inveigle2 weaker sight: Who by her wicked arts, and wiely skill, Too false and strong for earthly skill or might, Unwares me wrought unto her wicked will, And to my foe betrayd, when least I feared ill.”3

33

Then stepped forth the goodly royall Mayd, And on the ground her selfe prostrating low, With sober countenaunce thus to him sayd; “O pardon me, my soveraine Lord, to sheow The secret treasons, which of late I know To have bene wrought by that false sorceresse. Shee onely she it is, that earst did throw This gentle knight into so great distresse, That death him did awaite in daily wretchednesse.

1 2

intendiment: consideration.

t’inveigle: to deceive. 3 Redcrosse claims that Duessa was conspiring with Orgoglio all along—something we have not heard before. Duessa seems to have been totally absent from Redcrosse’s supposedly complete autobiography (stanzas 15–16). Una did not intervene. This omis-

sion represents a sin, which is why Spenser arranges to expose him—but a venial sin, for apparently children can legitimately lie to parents and keep them in the dark about love affairs. See Priscilla’s lies, engineered by Calidore, to her father about what she was up to in the forest (VI.iii.16–19), and, for a source, ACH note ad loc.

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34

“And now it seemes, that she suborned hath This crafty messenger with letters vaine, To worke new woe and improvided scath,1 By breaking of the band betwixt us twaine; Wherein she used hath the practicke paine2 Of this false footman, clokt with simplenesse, Whome if ye please for to discover plaine, Ye shall him Archimago find, I ghesse, The falsest man alive; who tries shall find no lesse.”

35

The king was greatly moved at her speach, And all with suddein indignation fraight,3 Bad on that Messenger rude hands to reach. Eftsoones the Gard, which on his state did wait, Attacht that faytor4 false, and bound him strait: Who seeming sorely chauffed at his band, As chained beare, whom cruell dogs doe bait, With ydle force did faine them to withstand, And often semblaunce made to scape out of their hand.

36

But they him layd full low in dungeon deepe, And bound him hand and foote with yron chains. And with continual watch did warely keepe; Who then would thinke, that by his subtile trains He could escape fowle death or deadly pains?5 Thus when that Princes wrath was pacifide, He gan renew the late forbidden bains,6 And to the knight his daughter deare he tyde, With sacred rites and vowes for ever to abyde.

37

His owne two hands the holy knotts did knitt, That none but death for ever can divide; His owne two hands, for such a turne most fitt,

1

improvided scath: unforeseen harm. practicke paine: cunning efforts. 3 fraight: filled. 4 attacht that faytor: arrested that impostor. 5 His foretold escape is modeled on Rev. 20.2–3, the imprisonment and subsequent escape of the dragon or Satan before he is finally consigned to the lake of fire (Rev. 2

20.7–10). See ACH note. Here it is prophesied that Archimago will do something that the dragon does in Rev., and he does it; see II.i.1ff. 6 bains: banns of marriage; the repeated announcements, for the purpose of allowing time for any objections to be raised, that so-and-so will marry so-and-so at a specific time.

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The housling1 fire did kindle and provide, And holy water thereon sprinckled wide; At which the bushy Teade2 a groome did light, And sacred lamp in secret chamber hide, Where it should not be quenched day nor night, For feare of evill fates, but burnen ever bright. 38

Then gan they sprinckle all the posts with wine, And made great feast to solemnize that day; They all perfumde with frankincense divine, And precious odours fetcht from far away, That all the house did sweat3 with great aray: And all the while sweete Musicke did apply Her curious4 skill, the warbling notes to play, To drive away the dull Melancholy; The whiles one sung a song of love and jollity.

39

During the which there was an heavenly noise Heard sownd through all the Pallace pleasantly, Like as it had bene many an Angels voice, Singing before th’eternall majesty, In their trinall triplicities5 on hye; Yett wist no creature, whence that hevenly sweet6 Proceeded, yet eachone felt secretly Himselfe thereby refte of his sences meet, And ravished with rare impression in his sprite.

1

housling: sacramental. Yet fire and water are only used in classical weddings, not Christian. See ACH and M&P notes. Another problem with this ritual is that it sounds more like an actual marriage than a betrothal. Spenser shows great interest in the betrothal period as a stage in a love affair. There was no separate ritual for betrothal in early modern England, aside from proclaiming the banns, which is really part of the wedding. 2 Teade: torch. 3 all the house did sweat: the state of a house that has been sprinkled with something—here, perfume. 4 curious: in physical sense, elaborate, intricate.

5 trinall triplicities: the nine orders of angels, a bit of traditional angelology mentioned chiefly for the sound of the words. The mysterious echo of the angels’ song to God within the secular love song symbolizes the interpenetration of earthly married love with Christian love of God; see also Spenser, Amoretti, 68; and Epithalamion, 64–70. This beautiful image may represent an erotic analogue to the Te Deum, or so called Ambrosian Hymn, in both the Catholic Mass and the Anglican Holy Communion. There angels are stated to join their voices with the human singers, or vice versa, singing “Holy, holy, holy . . .” etc. 6 sweet: sweet sound.

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40

Great joy was made that day of young and old, And solemne feast proclaymd throughout the land, That their exceeding merth may not be told: Suffice it heare by signes to understand The usuall joyes at knitting of loves band. Thrise happy man the knight himselfe did hold, Possessed of his Ladies hart and hand, And ever, when his eie did her behold, His heart did seeme to melt in pleasures manifold.

41

Her joyous presence and sweet company In full content he there did long enjoy, Ne wicked envy, ne vile gealosy His deare delights were hable to annoy: Yet swimming in that sea of blisfull joy, He nought forgott, how he whilome had sworne, In case he could that monstrous beast destroy, Unto his Faery Queene backe to retourne: The which he shortly did, and Una left to mourne.

42

Now strike your sailes yee jolly Mariners, For we be come unto a quiet rode, Where we must land some of our passengers, And light this weary vessell of her lode. Here she a while may make her safe abode, Till she repaired have her tackles spent, And wants supplide. And then againe abroad On the long voiage whereto she is bent: Well may she speede and fairely finish her intent. Finis Lib. I.

THE LETTER TO RALEIGH A Letter of the Authors expounding his whole intention in the course of this worke: which for that it giueth great light to the Reader, for the better vnderstanding is hereunto annexed. To the Right noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh knight, Lo. Wardein of the Stanneryes, and her Maiesties liefetenaunt of the County of Cornewayll.1 Sir knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, and this booke of mine, which I have entituled the Faery Queene, being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good aswell for avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned.The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline:2 Which for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible3 and pleasing, being coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter, then for profite of the ensample: I chose the historye of king Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In which I have followed all the antique Poets historicall, first Homere, who in the Persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his Odysseis: then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person of Aeneas: after him Ariosto comprised them 1

Appended to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh,” also called “A Letter of the Authors,” has been read as a preface, detailing both the larger plot and the poetics underlying the poem. It was not included in the 1596 edi-

tion, and so only discusses the first three books directly. 2 discipline: learning, training, orderly conduct, the system by which a church exercises control over its members. 3 plausible: deserving applause, acceptable.

205

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both in his Orlando:1 and lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that part which they in Philosophy call Ethice, or vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo:The other named Politice in his Godfredo.2 By ensample of which excellente Poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised,3 the which is the purpose of these first twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encoraged, to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hee came to be king.4 To some I know this Methode will seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the use of these dayes seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon preferred before Plato, for that the one in the exquisite depth of his judgement, formed a Commune welth such as it should be, but the other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a government such as might best be: So much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by ensample, then by rule.5 So have I laboured to doe in the person of Arthure: whome I conceive after his long education by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery land. And yet in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady, this latter part in some places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phoebe and Cynthia being both names of Diana).6 So in the person of 1

Lodovico Ariosto, Italian author of Orlando Furioso (1532). 2 Torquato Tasso, Italian author of Rinaldo (1562) and Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), in which the hero Godfredo embodies public or political virtues. 3 Aristotle does not name twelve particular moral virtues in the Nicomachaean Ethics. There are, however, several Medieval and Renaissance commentaries on Aristotle from which twelve could be construed. 4 Spenser indicates that he planned twelve books for The Faerie Queene and would

willingly write twenty-four, the former matching Virgil, the latter Homer. 5 Spenser says that Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, celebrated for teaching by example, is commonly preferred to Plato’s Republic, which taught by precepts. 6 Belphoebe appears in Books Two, Three, and Four. Cynthia refers to Raleigh’s poem of that name, which also celebrated Elizabeth. Spenser suggests that Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, represents Elizabeth’s public role as monarch, while Belphoebe personifies her private, virginal life.

The Letter to Raleigh

207

Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particular, which vertue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue, which I write of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues, I make xii. other knights the patrones, for the more variety of the history: Of which these three bookes contayn three.The first of the knight of the Redcrosse, in whome I expresse Holynes:The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette forth Temperaunce: The third of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the Methode of a Poet historical is not such, as of an Historiographer. For an Historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a Poet thrusteth into the middest,1 even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a pleasing Analysis of all.The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an Historiographer should be the twelfth booke, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queene kept her Annuall feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, are in these xii books severally handled and discoursed.The first was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe a tall clownishe 2 younge man, who falling before the Queen of Faries desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen, that being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after entred a faire Ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a white Asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the Armes of a knight, and his speare in the dwarfes hand. Shee falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned that her father and mother an ancient King and Queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen3 Castle, who thence suffred them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wondering, and the Lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly importuned his desire. In the end the Lady told him that unlesse that armour which she brought, would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint Paul v. Ephes.4) that he could not succeed in that enterprise, which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furnitures5 thereunto, he seemed

1

4

2

5

See Horace, Ars Poetica, 146–52. clownishe: rustic. 3 brasen: strong like brass.

See Eph. 6.11–17. dewe furnitures: proper equipment.

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the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady. And eftesoones1 taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge Courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke, vz. A gentle knight was pricking on the playne. &c. The second day ther came in a Palmer bearing an Infant with bloody hands, whose Parents he complained to have bene slayn by an Enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him some knight, to performe that adventure, which being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same Palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole subject thereof.2 The third day there came in, a Groome who complained before the Faery Queene, that a vile Enchaunter called Busirane had in hand a most faire Lady called Amoretta, whom he kept in most grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her body.Whereupon Sir Scudamour the lover of that Lady presently tooke on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason of the hard Enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but rather as Accidents, then intendments.3 As the love of Britomart, the overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like.4 Thus much Sir, I have briefly overronne to direct your understanding to the welhead of the History, that from thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ye may as in a handfull gripe al the discourse, which otherwise may happily5 seeme tedious and confused. So humbly craving the continuaunce of your honorable favour towards me, and th’eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. 23. January. 1589.6

Yours most humbly affectionate. Ed. Spenser.

1

eftesoones: immediately. This description is at variance with the beginning of Book Two at several points— e.g., the Palmer is already with Guyon when they encounter the bloody baby in Canto One. 2

3

intendments: matters of central import. This description seems to make Scudamour the hero, rather than Britomart. 5 happily: by chance. 6 In the new calendar, 1590. 4

THE LIFE OF EDMUND SPENSER Spenser (c. 1552–1599) was from a merchant family, possibly involved in the cloth trade and probably living in London. Although he may have been related to the noble family of Spencers, Spenser was not a gentleman. He was fortunate to attend the Merchant Taylors’ School, an academy founded by the tailors’ guild, and was registered there as a “poor scholar.” The school, however, was excellent; in his eight years there, Spenser received a humanist education that was rich in classical scholarship and languages. In 1569 he entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Again he was a scholarship student, called a sizar, earning room and board by performing servants’ duties. In the same year that he arrived at Cambridge, Spenser was first published: several of his translations from Italian and French appeared in the Protestant miscellany A Theatre for Worldlings. Spenser completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1573, and then, in 1576, a Master of Arts (finishing 66th out of a class of 70). Spenser then began a career as secretary to high-ranking men, a position of some importance involving a broad array of duties that included much traveling and writing. Intermittent records show him serving as an emissary for the earl of Leicester, and in 1578 he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. In 1579 he married Maccabaeus Chylde; we know little about the couple’s family life other than the fact that they had two children. In 1580 he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, and traveled there with him. Spenser’s career as a secretary and subsequent work as a civil servant in Ireland no doubt took up much of his time. But he was simultaneously establishing a second career as a poet. Probably while working for Leicester, Spenser met Philip Sidney and entered into his sophisticated literary circle. In 1579 Spenser published The Shepheardes Calendar, his innovative and enormously influential collection of pastorals. It revealed Spenser as not only one of England’s most skilled poets, but as a deeply interested and progressive Protestant thinker. He also cultivated his university friendship with the humanist scholar Gabriel Harvey, which in 1580 led to the publication of several of their letters. The Harvey letters mention several lost works, and suggest that by 1580 Spenser had begun working on The Faerie Queene. Meanwhile, in Ireland with Lord Grey, Spenser participated in the complicated and exceedingly violent project of English colonialism. Grey was sent to govern a country that was struggling broadly against English domination, and he adopted a strategy of overwhelming force, including the notorious slaughter of 600 military prisoners at Smerwick, and policies aimed at subduing the population through famine. To what 209

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extent Spenser participated in Grey’s governance, and to what extent he merely accompanied him and performed secretarial duties, is unclear. But it is clear that Spenser profited personally from empire building. Although Grey was recalled to England in 1582, Spenser made Ireland his permanent home, first in the New Abbey estate, and in 1589 in the three thousand acres of the Kilcolman estate. Throughout the 1580s, Spenser received a number of governmental appointments and established himself in Ireland as a well-off planter and gentleman. His complex relationship to Ireland is largely understood through A View of the Present State of Ireland, a prose dialogue that forthrightly defends Grey’s violent tactics and advocates deeply repressive measures against the Irish. It has called forth both defenses of the poet and declarations of his complicity in the outrages of colonialism. The subtleties of A View cast a similarly complicated light on The Faerie Queene, which was written in Ireland, and reflects its beautiful and pitifully war-torn landscape. In Ireland Spenser became friends with the explorer, author, and courtier, Sir Walter Raleigh, who in 1589 traveled with him to England. Probably with the sponsorship of Raleigh, Spenser presented the first three books of The Faerie Queene to Elizabeth, who, by Spenser’s report, was well pleased. Spenser secured the printer William Ponsonby in London, and Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were published in 1590. The poem was a clear effort to win court favor, with a dedication to Elizabeth and as many as seventeen dedicatory sonnets to the major figures in court. As a reward, Spenser was granted a pension of £50 a year for life. Such a position in the patronage system of the day was not unusual, as poetry was commonly used as a means of preferment in court— for noblemen such as Sidney and Raleigh, it was one more personal accomplishment; for those like Spenser who were not noble, it was a way to win social and economic advantages. Spenser, however, maintained skepticism toward court life. In his pastoral “Colin Clouts Come Home Again,” which tells of his and Raleigh’s journey to court, Colin declares that it is no sort of life, For shepheard fit to lead in that same place, Where each one seeks with malice and with strife, To thrust downe other into foule disgrace, Himselfe to raise. (688–92) Spenser returned to Ireland, where he lived, worked, and wrote throughout the 1590s. He published several important poems under the title of Complaints in 1591. In 1594 he married Elizabeth Boyle, resulting

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in at least one child, and in the following year he published Amoretti and Epithalamion, which celebrate their love and marriage. Throughout these years he continued work on The Faerie Queene, and in 1596 published the second edition. This extended the poem to six books; its final form was reached in the posthumous 1609 edition, with the inclusion of the fragment of a seventh book, The Mutabilitie Cantos. In 1596 he also published Fowre Hymnes and Prothalamion. Spenser may have traveled to London to oversee the second printing of The Faerie Queene. If so, he returned to an Ireland wracked by rebellion. In 1598 the Tyrone Rebellion reached Munster, and Spenser and his family fled Kilcolman just before the estate was sacked and burned. Spenser carried letters from the President of Munster to the Privy Council in England, describing the military crisis. On January 13, 1599, while still in England, Spenser died. His life ended under the shadow cast by the destruction of his home and the scattering of his interests in Ireland, which Ben Jonson described, possibly hyperbolically, as dying “for lack of bread.” Spenser’s hearse was reportedly attended by poets, who threw their verses and pens into his tomb as he was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

TEXTUAL NOTES This text is based upon the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, London: printed by John Wolfe for William Ponsonbie (STC 23081). It was edited from a reproduction of the original in the British Library by way of microfilm (UMI, Early English Books, 1475–1640). It has been checked against the Faults Escaped printed at the end of the 1590 edition (F.E.), and against the 1596 edition (STC 23082) and the 1609 edition (STC 23083). Quotation marks have been added; i, j, s, u, and v have been modernized; and abbreviations, ampersands, and diphthongs have been spelled out. Departures from the 1590 edition have been made with the aim of clarifying the text for modern readers. The table below lists substantive variants. ii.Arg.3 stead] F.E., 1596, 1609; steps, 1590. ii.16.5. stand senceless] F.E., 1596, 1609; stands fenceless, 1590. ii.17.5 cruell spies] F.E.; cruelties, 1590, 1596, 1609. ii.32.9 plaints] 1596, 1609; plants, 1590. iv.22.8 corse] F.E., 1596, 1609; course, 1590. iv.45.5 of my new joy] F.E., 1609; of new joy, 1590, 1596. vi.26.5 fiers and fell] F.E., 1596, 1609; swift and cruell, 1590. vi.39.7 (quoth he)] 1596, 1609; (quoth she), 1590. vi.44.1 fell] 1596, 1609; full, 1590. viii.Arg.3 the Gyaunt] F.E.; that Gyaunt,1590, 1596, 1609.

ix.Arg 2 hands] 1590; bands, F.E., 1596, 1609. In following 1590 here, in accordance with ix.1.8–9, I disagree with ACH. ix.9.5. Timons] F.E., 1596, 1609; Cleons, 1590. ix.12.9 on] F.E., 1609; at, 1590, 1596. ix.52.1 saw] 1596, 1609; heard, 1590. x.16.8 her] F.E.; be, 1590, 1596, 1609. x.20.5 Dry-shod . . . tway;] 1609; not in 1590, 1596. xi.3.1-9 And . . . misery.] 1596, 1609; not in 1590. This entire stanza appears for the first time in 1596. xi.30.5 one] F.E.; it, 1590, 1596, 1609. xi.41.4 Nor] 1609; For, 1590, 1596. xii.34.2 vaine] F.E., 1596, 1609; faine, 1590.

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GLOSSARY addressed/dressed: Directed, arranged, made ready for a purpose. affray: Frighten. amate/mate: Frustrate, frighten. approved: Proved by testing and experience. aread: Tell, explain, express; passive: aredd. astownd: Confused, stunned; similar to astonied, astond. balefull: In a passive sense: wretched, tormented; active: dire, fatal, bloodthirsty. bewray: Manifest the presence of. blent: Blemished or blinded. borne: Carried off. can: Did. caytive:

In a moral sense: base; physical sense: captive.

charet:

Chariot, cart.

chaufed:

Irritated, physically or mentally or both.

chear: Noun: disposition as manifested by external demeanor; intransitive verb: cheer up. couch: Bring a spear down from its vertical position and lay it horizontally in the rest. curious:

In objective sense: elaborate.

despight:

Insult or wrathful response thereto.

devise/devize: Talk. dight:

Dressed, arranged for a purpose.

dwell:

Remain.

earst: Recently, a little while ago. Eftsoones/eftesoones: immediately. eke:

Then; in consciously archaistic use: forthwith,

Adv.: also.

embrewd/imbrewd: Steeped, soaked. equal: errant:

Impartial. On a quest. 213

Glossary

214

fain, faine, fayne: Adj. or adv.: eager, happy to do something (one possible meaning). fell:

Ruthless.

fitt:

Mood.

forlore:

Abandoned.

forwearied: Very wearied. fray:

Verb: make afraid.

Furies:

Deities who see that crimes, especially murder, are avenged.

german:

Relative.

girlonds: Garlands. guerdon: guise:

Reward.

Behavior.

habiliment:

Attire.

hardly: With difficulty. heben: hight:

Ebon, of ebony. Am called, designated; past tense: hot.

impe: Scion, offspring, with no sense of the modern impish. implyes:

Enfolds.

kind/unkind: In its older sense: natural/unnatural. launch(ed): light:

Pierce(ed).

Frivolous, sexually wanton; lightly: frivolously.

meed:

Due reward or sometimes punishment.

mote: Past tense of verb, might. mould:

Structure, something made out of something.

noyous: Harmful. or: Whether (one possible meaning). ought:

Owned.

payne:

Care (as in painstaking), industry.

Paynim: pight:

Non-Christian, especially Saracen or Muslim.

Securely placed, installed.

pine: Noun: emaciation; pine/pined, verb: starve, pine away, also cause somebody to do so.

Glossary

priefe:

Experiential test.

prov’d:

Tested by experience, synomous with approved.

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prowest:

Superlative of prow, adj.: having prowess, or fighting ability.

purpose:

Topic of conversation.

quite/quight: raught: read:

Requite, repay.

Variant form of reached. Figure out, tell.

reave:

Snatch, take away violently; past tense: Reft.

rive/riven: routes:

Split open.

Crowds.

rusty: Filthy or defiled, usually from use, not disuse. ruth: Noun: pity; verb is rue/rew. salvage: Spenser’s unvarying spelling of savage; as adj.: wild; as noun: wild humanoid. Sarazin: Saracen, Muslim from the Near East. seely, silly: Innocent. sithens/sithence: meaning of “sith.”

Since. As conjunctive adverb, synonymous with one

spright: Spirit, either an independent being with a body made of air, or the immaterial part of a human being. stedd:

Stead, place.

stownd: painful.

A short period of time, usually defined by the context as

stowre:

A time of turmoil, pain, and stress.

talaunts:

Talons.

teene/tine: Sorrow, trouble. tho:

Then.

thrall:

Prisoner.

thrill, thrild:

Pierce, pierced.

trayne(s): Trickery. trayne, traine: Of animals, tail; of humans, retinue. uneath: easy

Ill at ease, or with difficulty. Opposite of eath which means

Glossary

216

unweeting: Unawares, not knowing; see weet. wayne:

Wagon, cart, or chariot.

weaker:

Too weak; the “-er” ending on any adj. often denotes “too.”

weedes: Clothes. weet:

Know.

wex, wexed, wox: Past tense of wax: grow, become; woxen: the perfect passive participle. whylome:

Formerly, some time ago.

wide: Off to one side. wight: Human being. wonne:

Verb: remain, dwell; noun: dwelling.

wont: Verb: was accustomed; adj.: wonted accustomed; unwonted: unaccustomed. wood: Crazy. wot(e):

Know; past tense of weet.

wot: Know. wreak: ycled:

Avenge. Clad, clothed.

INDEX OF CHARACTERS References to and appearances of major characters in Book One are listed by canto and stanza. In parentheses are references and appearances in other books, listed by book, canto, and stanza. This index is indebted to Shohachi Fukuda’s “The Characters of The Faerie Queene” in ACH. Abessa, iii.10–23. Archimago, i.29–55; ii.2–11; iii.24–39; vi.34–48; xii.24–36. (II.i.1–25; iii.11–19; vi.47–51; viii.10–22, 56; III.iv.45.) Arthur, vii.29–ix.20. (II.viii.17–xi.49; III.1.1–18; iv.45–v.12; IV.vii.42–ix.37; V.viii.4–45; ix.2–50; x.4–xi.35; VI.v.11–viii.30.) Caelia, x.3–11, 68. Charissa, x.16, 29–34. Contemplation, the Hermit, x.46–67. Corceca, iii.12–23. Despaire, ix.21–54. Dragon, the, xi.4–55; xii.9–11. Duessa, ii.13–45; iv.2–3; 37–51; v.11–44; vii.2–18; viii.25–49; xii.24–36. (II.i.8–30; IV.i.17–32; v.11; V.ix.36–50; x.4.) Dwarf, Una’s, i.6–13; ii.6; v.45–52; vii.19–28, 52. Eden, King of, xii.3–5, 12–41. Errour, i.13–26. Faerie Queene, the, Proem 2; 4; i.3; vii.36; ix.13–15; x.58–9; xi.7; xii.41. (II.i.28; ii.40–3; ix.2–7; x.70–6; III.i.2; ii.3; iv.3; IV.iv.17; V.1.3–4; VI.x.1, 4, 28.) Fidelia, x.12–22. Fidessa, See Duessa. Fradubio and Fralissa, ii.28–44.

George, St.; Georgos, x.66 (real name of Redcrosse Knight; see entry). Gloriana, See Faerie Queene, the. Ignaro, viii.30–37. Lion, the, iii.5–9, 19–20, 41–2. Lucifera, iv.8–43; v.5–16, 45–53. Mercie, x.34–46. Merlin, vii.36; ix.5. (III.ii.18–26; iii.10–62.) Night, v.20–45. Orgoglio, vii.7–18; viii.2–24. Redcrosse Knight, passim. (II.i.25–34; III.1.20–67; ii.4–16; iii.62; iv.4; V.xi.53.) Sansfoy, ii.12–19, 25. Sansjoy, ii.25; iv.38–51; v.5–13; 20–44. Sansloy, ii.25; iii.33–42; vi.4–8, 40–47. (II.ii.18; 20–26.) Satyrane, vi.20–47. (III.vii.29–61; viii.43–52; ix.17, 27; x.1; xi.3–6; IV.ii.25–7; iv.15–44; v.22–6.) Speranza, x.12–22. Timias, vii.37; viii.3–29. (II.viii.17; ix.11; xi.29–48; III.i.18; v.12–50; IV.vii.23–viii.18; VI.v.11–vi.16; vii.39–49; viii.4-6, 27.) Trevisan, ix.21–37. Una, i.4–36; ii.7–8; iii.2–44; vi.2–47; vii.20–52; viii.26–8, 42–9; ix.52–3; x.2–68; xi.1–5, 32, 50, 55, xii.7–41.

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WORKS CITED AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING Items marked with an asterisk are recommended for further reading. Aeschylus. The Eumenides. Translated by Richmond Lattimore. Greek Tragedies, vol. 3. Edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. 3 vols. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1960.* Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri with Translation and Comment by John D. Sinclair. 3 vols. New York: Oxford University Press, 1961.* Auerbach, Erich. “Figura.” Translated by Ralph Manheim. Scenes from the Drama of European Literature: Six Essays. New York: Meridien Books, 1959. 11–76. Benson, Larry D. Sir Thomas Malory. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976.* [Bible, Geneva] The Bible, that is, the Holy Scriptures conteined in the Olde and Newe Testament. London: Christopher Barker, 1594. Bloomfield, Morton. “A Grammatical Approach to Personification-Allegory.” Essays and Explorations: Studies in Ideas, Language, and Literature. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1970. 243–60. ———. The Seven Deadly Sins. East Lansing, MI: Michigan State University Press, 1967.* Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Riverside Chaucer. 3rd ed. Edited by Larry D. Benson. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1987. Chew, Samuel Claggett. The Pilgrimage of Life. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1962. Chrétien de Troyes. Yvain, or the Knight with the Lion. Translated by Ruth Harwood Cline. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1975.* Collinson, Patrick. The Elizabethan Puritan Movement. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1967. ———. “The Elizabethan Church and the New Religion.” The Reign of Elizabeth I. Edited by Christopher Haigh. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1985. 169–94. Comes, Natalis. See: Lotspeich. Cooper, Helen. The English Romance in Time: Transforming Motifs from Geoffrey of Monmouth to the Death of Shakespeare. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004.* Cooper, Thomas. Thesaurus Linguae Romanae et Britannicae. 1565. Menston, England: Scolar Press, 1969. Cullen, Patrick. The Infernal Triad:The Flesh, the World, and the Devil in Spenser and Milton. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1974.

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Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

219

Davis, Walter R. Sidney’s Arcadia.A Map of Arcadia: Sidney’s Romance in Its Tradition. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1965. Frye, Northrop. The Secular Scripture: A Study of the Structure of Romance. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1976.* Gless, Darryl J. Interpretation and Theology in Spenser. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994. Gower, John. Confessio amantis. Edited by Russell Peck. New York: Rinehart, 1968. Greenlaw, Edwin, et al., eds. The Works of Edmund Spenser, A Variorum Edition. Eleven vols. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1932–1957. Hadfield, Andrew, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Spenser. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.* Haigh, Christopher. “The Church of England, the Catholics and the People.” The Reign of Elizabeth I. Edited by Christopher Haigh. Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 1985. 195–219. Hamilton, A. C., ed. Essential Articles for the Study of Edmund Spenser. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1972.* ———. The Structure of Allegory in The Faerie Queene. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961. Hamilton, A. C., et al., eds. Spenser Encyclopedia. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990.* Hankins, John E. Source and Meaning in Spenser’s Allegory. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1961. Hawes, Stephen. The Works of Stephen Hawes. Introduction by Frank J. Spang. Delmar, NY: Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints, 1975. Heale, Elizabeth. The Faerie Queene: A Reader’s Guide. 2nd ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.* Homer. The Iliad of Homer. Translated by Richmond Lattimore. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1951.* Homer. The Odyssey. Translated by E.V. Rieu. Baltimore: Penguin, 1951.* Hooker, Richard. The Works. Arranged by John Keble; revised by R.W. Church and F.W. Paget. 3 vols. New York: Burt Franklin, 1970 [repr. of Oxford, 1888]. Hough, Graham. A Preface to The Faerie Queene. New York: Norton, 1963. Jacobus de Voragine. The Golden Legend; or, Lives of the Saints as Englished by William Caxton. Edited by F[rederick] Ellis. 7 vols. London: J.M. Dent, 1900.* Kaske, Carol V. “The Dragon’s Spark and Sting and the Structure of Red Cross’s Dragon-Fight: The Faerie Queene, I.xi–xii.” In Essential Articles for the Study of Edmund Spenser, edited by A.C. Hamilton, 425–46. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1972.

220

Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

———. “How Spenser Really Used Stephen Hawes.” Unfolded Tales: Essays on Renaissance Romance. Edited by George M. Logan and Gordon Teskey. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989. 119–36. ———. Spenser and Biblical Poetics. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1999. ———. “Spenser’s Pluralistic Universe: The View from the Mount of Contemplation (Faerie Queene, I.x).” In, Contemporary Thought on Edmund Spenser. Edited by Richard C. Frushell and Bernard J. Vondersmith, 121–49, 320–33. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1975. Kennedy, William J. “Rhetoric, Allegory, and Dramatic Modality in Spenser’s Fradubio Episode.” English Literary Renaissance 3:351–68. King, John N. Spenser’s Poetry and the Reformation Tradition. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990. Lake, Peter. Anglicans and Puritans? Presbyterianism and English Conformist Thought from Whitgift to Hooker. London, Boston: Unwin, Hyman, 1988. Langland, William. The Vision of Piers the Plowman: A Complete Edition of the BText. Edited by A.V.C. Schmidt. London: Dent (Everyman), 1978. Lewis, C.S. The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1938.* Lorris, Guillaume de, and Jean de Meun. The Romance of the Rose. Translated into English Verse by Harry W. Robbins. Edited and with an Introduction by Charles W. Dunn. New York: Dutton, 1962. Lotspeich, Henry Gibbons. Classical Mythology in the Poetry of Edmund Spenser. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990. [Translates all passages in Natalis Comes to which Spenser refers.] Lovelace, Richard. “To Lucasta, Going to the Wars.” Richard Aldington, ed. The Viking Book of Poetry of the English-Speaking World. New York: Viking Press, 1944. 446–7. Low, Anthony. “Sin, Penance and Privatization in the Renaissance: Redcrosse and the True Church.” Ben Jonson Journal 5 (1998): 1–35. Luther, Martin. Martin Luther: Selections from His Writings. Edited by John Dillenberger. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1961. Maclean, Hugh, and Anne Lake Prescott, eds. Edmund Spenser’s Poetry, 3rd edition. New York: Norton, 1993. Malory, Sir Thomas. Le Morte D’Arthur [Caxton version]. Edited by Janet Cowen. Introduction by John Lawlor. 2 vols. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1969.* Marotti, Arthur. “Alienating Catholics in Early Modern England: Recusant Women, Jesuits, and Ideological Fantasies.” Catholicism and Anti-Catholicisn in Early Modern England. Edited by Arthur Marotti. New York: St. Martin’s, 1999. 1–34.

Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

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Miller, Jacqueline. “The Omission in Red Cross Knight’s Story: Narrative Inconsistencies in The Faerie Queene.” ELH: A Journal of Literary History 53 (1986): 279–88. Oram, William A. Edmund Spenser. New York: Twayne Publishers; London: Prentice Hall International, 1997.* Ovid. Metamorphoses. Translated by Frank Justus Miller. 2 vols. London: Heinemann; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1921–1922.* Phillips, James E. “Spenser’s Syncretistic Religious Imagery.” ELH: A Journal of Literary History 36 (1969): 110–30. Roche, Thomas P. Edmund Spenser: The Faerie Queene. New York: Penguin, 1978. ———. “Spenser’s Muse.” Unfolded Tales: Essays on Renaissance Romance. Edited by George M. Logan and Gordon Teskey. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989. 162–88. Sidney, Sir Philip. The Countess of Pembroke´s Arcadia (the Old Arcadia). Edited, with introduction and commentary, by Jean Robertson. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973. ———. The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia (The New Arcadia). Edited by Victor Skretkowicz. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970. Sophocles. Oedipus the King. Translated by David Grene. Greek Tragedies, v. 3. Edited by David Grene and Richmond Lattimore. 3 vols. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1960.* Spenser, Edmund. Edmund Spenser: The Faerie Queene. Edited by Thomas P. Roche and C. Patrick O’Donnell. New York: Penguin, 1978.* ———. Edmund Spenser’s Poetry. Selected and edited by Hugh Maclean and Anne Lake Prescott. 3rd ed. New York: Norton, 1993.* ———. The Faerie Queene. 1596 Facsimile. Introduction by Graham Hough. London: Scolar Press, 1977. ———. The Faerie Queene. Edited by A. C. Hamilton. Text edited by Hiroshi Yamashita and Toshiyuki Suzuki. New York: Longman, 2001.* ———. Shorter Poems. Edited by Richard McCabe. London: Penguin, 1999.* ———. The Works of Edmund Spenser.A Variorum Edition. Edited by Edwin Greenlaw et al. 11 vols. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1932–1957. ———. The Yale Edition of the Shorter Poems of Edmund Spenser. Edited by William A. Oram et al. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989. Tasso, Torquato. Jerusalem Delivered: Being a translation into English verse by Edward Fairfax of Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata. Introduction by John Charles Nelson. New York: Capricorn Books, 1963.

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Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

———. Tasso’s Allegory of Gerusalemme liberata. Translated by Lawrence Rhu. In The Genesis of Tasso’s Narrative Theory, by Lawrence Rhu, 155–62. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1993. Torczon, Vern[on]. “On Spenser’s Orgoglio and Despaire.” Texas Studies in Language and Literature 3 (1991): 123–8. Virgil. “Aeneid” in Virgil. Translated by H. R. Fairclough. 2 vols. London: Heinemann; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1966–1967 Waters, D. Douglas. Duessa as Theological Satire. Columbia, MO: University of Missouri Press, 1970. Watkins, John. “James I and Elizabethan Anti-Catholicism.” Catholicisim and AntiCatholicism in Early Modern England. Edited by Arthur Marotti. New York: St. Martin’s, 1999. 116–36. Weatherby, Harold. Mirrors of Celestial Grace: Patristic Theology in Spenser’s Allegory. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994. Wells, Robin H. “Spenser’s Christian Knight: Erasmian Theology in The Faerie Queene, Book I.” Anglia 97 (1979): 350–66.* Whitaker, Virgil K. The Religious Basis of Spenser’s Thought. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1950.* Williams, Arnold. “Medieval Allegory: An Operational Approach.” Poetic Theory/Poetic Practice: Papers of the Midwest Modern Language Association 1969, presented at the annual meeting for 1968. October 17, 18 and 19, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Edited by Robert Scholes. Iowa City, IA: Midwest Modern Language Association, 1969. 77–84.* Woodhouse, A.S.P. “Nature and Grace in The Faerie Queene.” In Essential Articles for the Study of Edmund Spenser, edited by A. C. Hamilton, 58–83. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1972. Yates, Frances. Astraea:The Imperial Theme in the Sixteenth Century. London: Routledge, 1975.

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For further information, please address Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 44937 Indianapolis, IN 46244-0937 www.hackettpublishing.com Cover art: Walter Crane illustration and ornament for Book Two, The Faerie Queene, ca. 1890. Cover design by Abigail Coyle Interior design by Elizabeth Wilson Composition by Professional Book Compositors Printed at Edwards Brothers, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spenser, Edmund, 1552?–1599. The faerie queene / Edmund Spenser. p. cm. Series general editor, Abraham Stoll; volume editors: bk. 1, Carol Kaske; bk. 5, Abraham Stoll. Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-87220-808-7 (bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-807-9 (pbk. : bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-802-8 (bk. 5) — ISBN 0-87220-801-X (pbk. : bk. 5) 1. Knights and knighthood—Poetry. 2. Epic poetry, English. 3. Virtues —Poetry. I. Stoll, Abraham Dylan, 1969– . II. Kaske, Carol V., 1933– . III. Title.

PR2358.A3K37 2006 821'.3—dc22 2005026668 ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-848-3 (cloth, bk. 2); 978-0-87220-847-6 (pbk., bk. 2) ISBN-10: 0-87220-848-6 (cloth, bk. 2); 0-87220-847-8 (pbk., bk. 2) eISBN: 978-1-60384-040-8 (e-book)

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CONTENTS Acknowledgments About the Annotation Introduction

vii ix xi

The Faerie Queene, Book Two The Letter to Raleigh The Life of Edmund Spenser Textual Notes Glossary Index of Characters Bibliography

1 225 229 232 236 239 240

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Two people, above all, have made this edition possible. The first is the General Editor, Abe Stoll, who generously invited me to participate in this project and provided meticulous guidance throughout the process. This volume is a testament, not just to our collaboration, but also to a decade of friendship. The other is Tiffany Alkan, who worked together with me at every stage and so made even the tedious parts of our task seem like a pleasure rather than a chore. I would compare her to the Palmer, except that it seems rather self-congratulatory; and besides, she despises the Palmer. So I will just say instead how fortunate I feel to have had such a colleague; I could not have asked for a better one. I would also like to thank Anne Lake Prescott and Jeff Dolven for their comments and advice. I am not sure what protocol exists, if any, for dedicating an edition of part of a poem. Still, this seems like an appropriate place to express my immense gratitude to my teachers and mentors, especially those at Cambridge, who fostered in me a love of Renaissance poetry that has been silently expanding ever since.

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ABOUT THE ANNOTATION All biblical quotations are taken from the Geneva Bible of 1560. References to classical poetry cite the line numbers of the Greek and Latin texts in the Loeb editions. My chief resources in composing the notes, after the Oxford English Dictionary (cited as OED), have been the Variorum and the Spenser Encyclopedia. I am also, of course, indebted to the previous editors of Book Two listed in the Bibliography––above all to A. C. Hamilton, whose masterly edition of the poem (Hamilton, 2001) I have sometimes cited directly (as “Hamilton”) but have also benefited from generally throughout. Citations from other books of The Faerie Queene are documented in this volume in the conventional format, listing book, canto, stanza, and line number. For example, V.vii.19.3 refers to Book Five, Canto Seven, stanza 19, line 3. Citations from Book Two do not list the book number: ix.8.9 refers to Book Two, Canto Nine, stanza 8, line 9.

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1. The Challenge of Temperance Books One and Two of The Faerie Queene begin in very similar fashion. In the opening cantos of Book One, the evil enchanter Archimago convinces the hero of that book, the Redcrosse knight, that the virtuous lady Una has committed a sexual sin. Redcrosse feels such outrage that he precipitously abandons Una, thus setting in motion the plot of the rest of the book. At the outset of Book Two, Archimago continues in the same vein: he dupes the noble Sir Guyon into believing that Redcrosse has sexually assaulted a maiden. In what seems an exact replay of the misunderstandings of the previous book, Guyon in his turn becomes duly outraged, and without further question he charges at Redcrosse. The two knights thunder furiously toward each other, but at the last moment Guyon thinks better of his rashness and turns his horse aside. He represses his fury, speaks to Redcrosse instead of attacking him, and so learns the truth about his own deception. Spenser has solved the first challenge confronting him in Book Two: how to make it different from Book One. The first book is concerned with the virtue of “holiness,” which might seem an all-encompassing term. Just half a canto into Book Two, however, Guyon has already demonstrated virtues that even the holy Redcrosse lacks. Yet Spenser is still faced with another, greater challenge: now that he has avoided repeating himself, how is he to make this second book interesting? The title page announces that Book Two will be dedicated to the virtue of “Temperaunce”—that is, moderation or self-restraint, such as Guyon displays when he refrains from battle. But how can the exhibition of such a virtue be grand or varied? Moderation is seldom spectacular; the very idea of “extreme temperance” is practically a contradiction. One can portray temperance under more and more extreme circumstances, but even then the narrative risks going nowhere. Guyon first reveals his peculiar greatness, as we have just seen, not by doing something, but by pointedly not doing something. The plot of temperance threatens to be one of inaction. Yet Book Two is not dull or static, and the reason has to do with the very nature of allegory as Spenser conceives it. The first thing to realize is that Guyon himself is not an embodiment of absolute temperance. The full title of Book Two reads as follows: “The second Booke of / the xi

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Faerie Queene. / Contayning / The Legend of Sir Guyon. / OR / Of Temperaunce.”1 The phrasing leaves open the possibility that “Sir Guyon” may be interchangeable with “Temperaunce.” But it is equally possible that “Of Temperaunce” is an alternate title for the book as a whole, and that Guyon is not temperance, but only the hero of a book about temperance. We soon find out that the latter is the case. Guyon is introduced together with a Palmer, or holy man, who accompanies him to keep him steady and steer him away from extremes. An allegorical embodiment of temperance, strictly conceived, would not need such a guide; he would, by definition, be unable to act any way but temperately. From his first appearance, then, we are aware that Guyon does not represent Temperance; nor is there any reason to say that he represents Will guided by Temperance (in the form of the Palmer), or that he represents any one thing at all. He is just Guyon—in a very real sense, “just a guy,” though a particularly temperate one. The fact that Guyon exceeds any straightforward, one-to-one correspondence to a concept permits a greater variety of plot. Although we never doubt that Guyon will conquer the forces of intemperance in the end, nevertheless he endures more vicissitudes along the way than he would if he represented an abstract, unchangeable virtue. As Harry Berger, one of the best commentators on Book Two, points out, Guyon suffers a number of serious setbacks: “We see Guyon separated first from his horse, then from his Palmer (Canto vi), finally from his consciousness and his protective armor and almost from his life” (Berger, 51). For all his admirable self-control, Guyon does not have complete command of his own body; at the end of Canto Seven, he momentously faints for lack of food and sleep. Whether this lapse is due to some error on his part is debatable, but it is certain that Guyon is not a paragon, let alone an abstraction. Nowhere is this more evident than in the climax of his story. At the end of Canto Twelve, Guyon successfully overthrows the enchantress Acrasia, who reduces people into beasts. Yet instead of turning his attention immediately to the task of freeing her captives, Guyon stays instead to wreak destruction on her home, the Bower of Bliss. But all those pleasaunt bowres and Pallace brave, Guyon broke downe, with rigour pittilesse; Ne ought their goodly workmanship might save

1

The titles of all six books follow this same style. The title appears above the introductory stanzas to the book, known as the “Proem.”

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Them from the tempest of his wrathfulnesse, But that their blisse he turn’d to balefulnesse: Their groves he feld, their gardins did deface, Their arbers spoyle, their Cabinets suppresse, Their banket houses burne, their buildings race, And of the fayrest late, now made the fowlest place.

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(xii.83)

Generations of critics have been troubled by this passage. The Bower, which has been described in lush detail throughout the canto, is certainly not an innocent place: it is filled with artifice and temptation. Yet it has also been described as “Paradise” (58.1, 70.4), a place of “Angelicall” harmony (71.3), even a place of temperance, “with season moderate / Gently attempred” (51.7–8). Guyon, however, makes no attempt to discriminate between what is good and what is bad in the Bower but systematically fouls whatever he finds. The knight of temperance has become a knight of “tempest.”2 Even if Guyon’s “tempest of wrathfulnesse” is justified, it does not seem very productive from a practical point of view. Once Guyon has ravaged the Bower, he and the Palmer transform Acrasia’s victims from beasts back into men. But some of the men feel “wrath” in their turn at having been restored (86.5), and indeed Book Two ends with a notable failure—a man named Gryll, who preferred his life of intemperance and upbraids Guyon for having turned him back from a hog into a man. Book Two may show the triumph of temperance, but Guyon in the end is neither wholly triumphant nor wholly temperate; even as he accomplishes his quest, he reveals his limitations, both practical and moral. These limitations are reemphasized by the book’s final, throwaway line, when the Palmer says, “But let us hence depart, whilest wether serves and winde” (xii.87.9). After all his accomplishments, the hero still depends upon wind and weather (both of which, not coincidentally, are synonyms for “tempest”). And these elements, as the Palmer recognizes and as the inconstant Phaedria had pointed out earlier (vi.23), cannot be controlled, even by the most even-tempered; they are purely a matter of chance. Guyon is simultaneously an ideal of temperate self-control and something quite different: a character, unpredictable and subject to tempests. The complexity of Guyon’s character is crucial, not only because it provides the book of temperance with narrative tension, but because all 2

It is a matter of debate whether “temper” and “tempest” are etymologically connected; the OED suggests that they probably are, “but the sense history of both words is prehistoric and obscure.” Either way, Spenser is playing on their similarity to suggest a complex relationship between the two ideas.

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successful allegory depends upon the interaction of different levels of reality. Allegory, in essence, consists in the embodying of abstractions: ideas such as “virtue” or “vice” are given physical form. But if these corporealized concepts never interact with actual human bodies like Guyon’s, then they may as well have remained abstract. For a reader, there is not much difference between reading that Virtue conquers Vice and reading that virtue conquers vice.3 But the heroes and heroines of The Faerie Queene are not virtues: in Spenser, Virtue does not conquer Vice; Guyon and Redcrosse do. Even the vices, moreover, are rarely one-dimensional; rather, the characters of the poem exist along a spectrum. Some of the evildoers Guyon encounters are indeed named for concepts––Furor, Occasion, Impotence––and act accordingly. But most have proper names and cannot be reduced to a single attribute. The “varlet” Atin, for instance, enters in Book Two, Canto Four, as a provoker of trouble and discord; but if we identify him simply as “Strife,” that does not explain why in Canto Six he bravely and selflessly leaps into a lake to help save his master Pyrochles. This tendency to exist on two different levels at once––on the one hand, to embody a changeless concept, and on the other hand, to exhibit complex, unpredictable behavior––characterizes every aspect of The Faerie Queene. Faerie Land itself has a dual nature: it is an allegorical microcosm of the whole world, a landscape in which universal struggles take place; at the same time, it is also a version of sixteenth-century Britain. As Spenser explains in “The Letter to Raleigh” (reproduced at the end of this volume), the Faerie Queen, Gloriana—whom all the knights serve, but who never actually appears in the poem—signifies both glory in the abstract and also the queen of England, Elizabeth. Yet Spenser goes on to point out that our world, too, operates on more than one level at once. Queen Elizabeth, for instance, “beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady.” In other words, not only is the allegorical 3

This is the drawback of The Purple Island (1633), an allegorical poem in twelve cantos by Phineas Fletcher, a follower of Spenser. Fletcher’s poem is a hyperextended imitation of two cantos of Book Two of The Faerie Queene: Canto Nine, in which Spenser describes the workings of the human body under the guise of a castle, and Canto Eleven, in which the castle is attacked by diseases and temptations. But Fletcher’s poem is less successful than Spenser’s because all the characters exist at the same level: vices, virtues, and diseases battle for possession of the human body, but nobody else participates in or even views their contest, which therefore has little narrative interest for the reader. A pictorial allegory may exist entirely on a single plane and still be effectively vivid; but if the embodied words of literary allegory engage only with other words, as they do in The Purple Island, then much of the effect is lost.

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world inhabited by figures who are partly “real” (like Guyon), but the real world contains figures who are partly allegorical: Elizabeth, in her role as monarch, embodies a changeless and immortal concept, even as she continues to exist as a mortal woman.4 The world of Sir Guyon is thus neither static nor distant, but complex and far closer than it at first appears.

2. The Forms of The Faerie Queene In 1590 Spenser published the first edition of The Faerie Queene, consisting of Books One through Three. At the end of the volume is a letter addressed to the great courtier and poet Sir Walter Raleigh, in which Spenser explains his methods and intentions for the poem thus begun. The work, Spenser writes, will consist of twelve books, each illustrating one of the moral virtues, with the possibility (if the first twelve books “be well accepted”) of further books illustrating political virtues. As it turns out, Spenser completed half of his original project before his death in 1599, bringing out a new edition in 1596 that contained Books One through Six. (An edition published a decade after Spenser’s death added a fragmentary seventh book.) Yet even as it stands, The Faerie Queene is one of the longest poems ever published in English. Each book reaches nearly the length of Virgil’s Aeneid, and each is divided (like the Aeneid) into twelve parts, or cantos, which contain a varying number of stanzas. In addition to the stanzas that make up the main body of the text, every canto begins with a four-line poem known as the argument, which sums up the plot of that canto. The arguments tend to be very matter-of-fact: they sometimes refer to characters, not by name, but simply by the vice or virtue they may be taken to represent. (In the argument to Book Two, Canto Four, for instance, Atin is called “strife”; the argument to Canto Six refers to Phaedria as “Merth.”) The arguments use a shorter line than the body of the poem, alternating verse of eight and six syllables––a lyric rather than heroic measure; each argument is thus the size and shape of a stanza from a ballad or a hymn.

4 Spenser is here voicing a well-known doctrine, that of “the king’s two bodies.” One of the corollaries to this concept is that the monarch can never die, since the instant he or she does, a successor becomes monarch without interval. Yet these two levels––changeless monarch, mortal individual––are no more discrete or clearly distinguishable in reality than in allegory. When Spenser wrote The Faerie Queene, Queen Elizabeth had neither produced an heir to the throne nor named a successor; the unpredictable actions of the mortal woman jeopardized the continuation of the monarchical body.

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The main part of every canto, however, is composed in a characteristic stanza form invented by Spenser, which was not used again with any success until the middle of the eighteenth century (see Section 5, below). The Spenserian stanza consists of a virtuosic intertwining of three rhymes over nine lines, in the pattern ababbcbcc; the lines are in iambic pentameter (ten syllables), except for the final one, which is an iambic hexameter, or “alexandrine” (twelve syllables). The stanza is at once asymmetrical and perfectly balanced. The a-rhyme stands prominently at the head of the stanza but appears only twice. The b-rhyme neither begins nor concludes the stanza but dominates by its unusual persistence. To repeat a rhyme sound four times presents an extraordinary challenge (especially in English, which is poorer in rhyme than Italian, which provides the nearest models to Spenser’s stanza)––yet Spenser manages it throughout his enormous poem. The c-rhyme is introduced late but then appears three times in four lines, including the longer final verse. The Spenserian stanza does not fall naturally into either halves or thirds. In fact, there is no single, preferable breaking point, as there is, for instance, in a sonnet, and this allows Spenser to vary the syntactical and logical structure from stanza to stanza. The twelve-syllable line concludes the stanza with satisfying finality; at the same time, although the last two lines rhyme, the difference in length prevents them from forming a couplet, which would run the risk of sealing off each stanza as if it were a Shakespearean sonnet rather than an element in a continuous narrative.5 As an example of the effectiveness of Spenser’s form, consider the moment mentioned above, when Guyon breaks off his charge against the Redcrosse knight— 1 Who seeing him from far so fierce to pricke, 2 His warlike armes about him gan embrace, 3 And in the rest his ready speare did sticke; 4 Tho when as still he saw him towards pace, 5 He gan rencounter him in equall race: 6 They bene ymett; both ready to affrap, When suddeinly that warriour gan abace 7

5 On the other hand, the alexandrine does offer a potential resting place. As Colin Burrow reads it, in a description that seems particularly apt to the challenges and temptations of Book Two, the structure of the Spenserian stanza “invites repose: the rhymes interlock and lace back into each other, and the final line draws its slow length along, inviting readerly delay. The form of the poem fights a continual benevolent war with its content. The knights who dominate the action . . . struggle against the reflective flow of Spenser’s verse, which ebbs backwards endlessly” (Burrow, 27).

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8 His threatned speare, as if some new mishap 9 Had him betide, or hidden danger did entrap. (i.26) Spenser here highlights the couplet in the middle of the stanza: in line 4, Guyon is seen charging at Redcrosse, and in the rhyming line 5, Redcrosse charges back. Line 6 introduces the climactic element with a new rhyme––the disastrous “affrap,” or blow, that the reader now feels is inevitable. But Guyon recovers his usual calm clear-headedness at just the same point (line 7) at which the stanza reverts to its b-rhyme, turning back from the new direction it has taken. Once Guyon and the stanza have both been recalled or reined in, the true nature of that new element becomes clear: “affrap” rhymes with the portentous “mishap” and “entrap.” As the stanza above reveals, the language of The Faerie Queene is unique. Ben Jonson in the early seventeenth century famously said that Spenser “writ no language,” and that is in some sense true; like Homer, Spenser uses a vocabulary that exists in his world only. He freely employs words and forms that were already obsolete in his time: by 1590, “tho” had long since ceased to mean “then,” and “ymett” was no longer used for “met,” even in poetry. Spenser also frequently coins new words. “Affrap” does not exist in English outside of The Faerie Queene, but Spenser trusts that its meaning will be clear from its context and from cognates in French and Italian. The term is all the more effective for being unfamiliar: it is introduced together with the c-rhyme as something new and unkown, as we have just noted, and it is intended to unsettle the reader––until Guyon’s habitual self-restraint brings us back to more familiar linguistic behavior. Spenser writes in a timeless form of English that resembles no other but is wholly appropriate to the world he creates in his poem, a Faerie Land that is both antique (it coexists with ancient Britain, from which Arthur has come to seek the Faerie Queen) and contemporary––it shadows forth the present, but in unfamiliar forms.

3. Sources Temperance:Aristotle’s and Plato’s Horses Temperance has a long history in both religious and philosophical writing. In the thirteenth century, St. Thomas Aquinas categorized it as one of the four “cardinal virtues” (together with Prudence, Justice, and Fortitude), a traditional grouping that derives ultimately from Book 4 of Plato’s Republic. Temperance in particular was much preached by Roman

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orators and philosophers, such as Cicero and Seneca; among the Roman poets, its great champion was Horace, whose idealization of the “golden mean” (aurea mediocritas) Spenser echoes in the argument to Canto Two. But Horace himself derives his notion from Greek philosophy, and the most influential sources for Spenser’s representation of temperance are to be found in two ancient Greek texts. The first of these is the Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle, whom Spenser specifically names as a model for his conception of the virtues in “The Letter to Raleigh.” Aristotle devotes a substantial section of his treatise (1145a–1152a) to defining temperance (sophrosune) and distinguishing between intemperance and incontinence (akrasia––a word that Spenser adopts as the name for his villainess in Book Two). The temperate person, according to Aristotle, is one whose desires are naturally moderate; the continent person, by contrast, feels strong desires but is able to control or resist them. Both concepts are essential to Spenser’s poem. At a narrative level, Guyon more often seems temperate: he is scarcely tempted at all either by Phaedria or by Mammon, and only occasionally does he need to be curbed by the Palmer. At an allegorical level, however, Guyon is constantly forced to contend with figures like Furor, Sansloy, Huddibras, Pyrochles, and Cymochles, who represent excesses of passion in one direction or another. In this sense, as has often been remarked, he comes closer to Aristotle’s notion of “continence,” struggling against the forces of akrasia and suppressing them. The other most influential classical text is Plato’s Phaedrus. It is possible that Spenser did not know this work directly, but one section of it was often repeated in Renaissance texts and appears strongly to have influenced the imagery of Book Two. In the famous passage, Socrates proposes to Phaedrus the following simile: “Let us then liken the soul to the natural union of a team of winged horses and their charioteer. . . . To begin with, our driver is in charge of a pair of horses; second, one of his horses is beautiful and good and from stock of the same sort, while the other is the opposite and has the opposite sort of bloodline. This means that chariot-driving in our case is inevitably a painfully difficult business” (Plato, 246a–b).6 The first horse, Socrates goes on to explain, is “a lover of honor with modesty and self-control,” while the second is a “companion to wild boasts and indecency” (253d–e). One of the chief duties of humans must be to curb the impulses of the unruly half—the bad horse––of our souls.

6 Quotations are from Plato, Phaedrus, translated and edited by Alexander Nehamas and Paul Woodruff (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 1995).

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There are horses throughout The Faerie Queene; the very word “chivalry” derives from the word for horse (French cheval ), and horsemanship is inseparable from chivalric romance. But Guyon’s troubled relationship to horses is particularly foregrounded, and from the very outset of Book Two, horses take on a distinctly Platonic cast. Guyon’s first heroic action, as we have seen, consists in restraining his own horse, turning it aside in the midst of a full galloping charge. Such control of a horse is unusual; even Redcrosse, holy and indeed saintly as he is, cannot match it: “But his fierce foe [Redcrosse] his steed could stay uneath, / Who prickt with courage kene, did cruell battell breath” (i.27). Throughout the rest of the book, the language of good horsemanship applies equally to self-control. The word “menage,” for instance, a technical term from horse training, appears frequently in Book Two: Guyon is able “To menage steeds” as well as to “menage and subdew his pride” (iv.1–2). The Palmer consciously invokes the same metaphor, blaming anyone “That to affections does the bridle lend” (iv.34); hence, at the end, we see Guyon still “Brydling his will, and maystering his might” (xii.53). Yet Spenser does not merely illustrate Plato’s simile but complicates and refreshes it. Guyon, it turns out, has little chance to display his horsemanship: by the end of the first canto he has lost his horse, which at the close of the book is still unrecovered. For eleven cantos, therefore, Guyon must fare and fight on foot, often to his own disadvantage. Meanwhile, his own “loftie steed” seems to change its nature. Stolen by Braggadocchio and hence forced to become (in Plato’s words) “companion to wild boasts and indecency” (Braggadocchio is guilty of both), Guyon’s horse in the wrong hands becomes unmanageable: “that valiaunt courser . . . despisd to tread in dew degree, / But chaufd and fom’d” (iii.46). In Spenser’s allegory, then, it is not the horse who is good or bad but only the rider. This becomes painfully clear in one of the most uncomfortable moments in the poem, when Guyon beheads Pyrochles’ mount: the sharpe steele arriving forcibly On his broad shield, bitt not, but glauncing fell On his horse necke before the quilted sell, And from the head the body sundred quight. So him dismounted low, he did compell On foot with him to matchen equall fight; The truncked beast fast bleeding, did him fowly dight.

(v.4)

Pyrochles immediately heaps abuse on Guyon for killing an innocent animal, and even though the blow was clearly accidental, the scene, with its bloody, truncated horse, is extremely disturbing. The situation might be

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different if Pyrochles’ horse were presented as monstrous, something more like Plato’s “bad” horse—“a crooked jumble of limbs with a short bull-neck, a pug nose, black skin, and bloodshot white eyes . . . shaggy around the ears––deaf as a post” (Plato, 253e). But no such description is given; besides, we have already seen in the case of Braggadocchio that a horse’s value depends wholly on its rider. Yet our very discomfort reinforces Spenser’s point. The aim, clearly, is not to do away with horses or with passions altogether: being horseless does Guyon no good, and killing a horse, even in self-defense, besmirches him. The aim is to learn to master our soul-horses; the virtue Spenser wishes to exalt is selfcontrol, not apathy.

Poetic Models Throughout The Faerie Queene, Spenser draws on an enormous range of poetic models, especially the classical epics of Homer and Virgil, and Book Two is no exception. Spenser’s Acrasia is closely modeled on Homer’s Circe, who turns men into pigs in Book 10 of the Odyssey. Likewise, most of Guyon’s adventures in Canto Twelve before arriving at Acrasia’s bower––the storms, the sirens, the rock, the whirlpool–– derive ultimately from Odysseus’ similar trials in the Odyssey, Books 9 through 12. Yet Homer may not always be the direct source: many of the same episodes would have been better known to Spenser through Virgil’s imitation of them in the Aeneid. Guyon himself, moreover, in his continual self-restraint, generally resembles Aeneas more than he does Odysseus. His pivotal visit to Mammon’s underground realm in Canto Seven seems to derive in equal parts from the description of Aeneas’ visit to the underworld in the Aeneid, Book 6 (a description later greatly expanded in Dante’s Inferno), and from the Gospel accounts of Satan’s temptation of Jesus––an example of how skillfully Spenser mingles material borrowed from disparate sources. Spenser also drew extensively upon the chivalric romances of Renaissance Italy. Some episodes of Book Two, including the stories of Mortdant and Amavia and that of Phaon, resemble subplots in Ludovico Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1532). But the section of the book that shows the most direct debt to Italian poetry is the concluding episode in the Bower of Bliss. Some elements have been traced to Gian Giorgio Trissino’s Italia Liberata dai Gotti (1547), but an even greater source is Torquato Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata (1581). Tasso’s masterpiece was published less than a decade before the first publication of The Faerie Queene, and an English translation appeared only afterward, in 1600; yet Spenser clearly knew the work well and relied upon it heavily for the

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climax to Book Two. The mingling of nature and art in the Bower’s construction, the fountain, the wanton maidens, the song of the rose, and the first description of Acrasia all derive, sometimes word for word, from Books 15 and 16 of Tasso’s poem.

4. Canto Ten: The Chronicle of British History At the end of Canto Nine, Guyon and Arthur begin to read a pair of enormous volumes that recount the histories of their respective countries, Faerie Land and Britain. Canto Ten then relates the substance of what they read, concentrating for the most part on the British history being perused by Arthur, which stretches from prehistoric times right up to the time of Arthur himself, whose reign is located at the very end of the Roman period, somewhere around the fifth century AD. Spenser did not invent the material he here recounts. Rather it was all traditional and often repeated by chroniclers and historians, though each one introduced novelties and variations (as did Spenser); and all is traceable to a single source, the twelfth-century Historia Regum Britanniae (History of the Kings of Britain), by Geoffrey of Monmouth. Spenser made direct use of Geoffrey’s History, which was reprinted several times in the sixteenth century, as well as of a number of its successors, up to and including Raphael Holinshed’s The Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1577; second ed. 1587), a source also used by Shakespeare for such plays as King Lear and Cymbeline. It is not known where Geoffrey found the material for his history. Some of it may have come from an oral tradition, but most of it probably grew from his own imagination. The names of his kings are often back-formations, invented to provide a plausible etymology for current place names––as, for instance, “Britain” itself, which Geoffrey derives from his mythological “Brutus,” the Trojan who first settled Britain. Geoffrey’s chronicle begins to coincide with what we now consider historical fact when it reaches a point in time for which there exist contemporary written accounts of Britain––namely, around the time of the Roman invasion of the first century BC. Even after this point, however, much of the material remains at least partly legendary, including the history of King Arthur himself. Yet for centuries Geoffrey’s accounts were accepted and transmitted as fact. By Spenser’s time historians had begun seriously to question parts of the traditional history, and some evidence suggests that Spenser himself had his doubts about the authenticity of Brutus (Harper, 21). But since Spenser so sedulously consulted and compared his sources, he clearly intended his account to represent, for the most part, a true history of his land.

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At first glance the entire canto, with its thumbnail sketches of dozens of characters who do not otherwise figure in the poem, might seem to be an anomalous intrusion. But on closer inspection the chronicle of monarchs proves to be integral to the rest of the book and the poem. First, there are major precedents for such an epic catalogue, and Spenser continues the practice at several other points in The Faerie Queene. Furthermore, the British history in Canto Ten reflects both on the theme of temperance that occupies Book Two and on Spenser’s allegorical method as a whole. In the first place, then, the list or catalogue constitutes one of the original features of western epic: Book 2 of Homer’s Iliad names every city in Greece that sent ships of warriors to Troy. This list most likely forms the oldest part of the Iliad; scholars conjecture that it once existed as an independent poem that was eventually incorporated into the Homeric epic. Although it interrupts the action that has just begun, it serves the important function of at once broadening the poem’s scope and making it more local: by naming individually so many cities of the Greek-speaking world, the poet succeeds simultaneously in depicting the Trojan War as a grand, pan-Hellenic enterprise, and in ensuring that his specific audience will recognize itself and its own homeland in the heroic catalogue. Spenser manages something similar in Canto Ten, which presents a grand sweep of time yet also singles out by name many local sites in Britain over a wide geographical range. Spenser continues this project in a separate geographical catalogue later in the poem, the epic list of the rivers of England in Book Four, Canto Eleven. (This canto also, coincidentally, constitutes perhaps the earliest part of Spenser’s poem: he was already considering a poem about English rivers as early as 1580.) Spenser’s British chronicle, however, is not primarily geographic but temporal, and in this sense it bears less resemblance to Homer’s catalogue of ships and more to the genealogical lists of the Bible. Detailed accounts of who begat whom mark the openings of both the Hebrew Bible (Genesis) and the New Testament (Matthew and Luke). These genealogies are crucial for displaying the unbroken continuity between the authors or audience of the text and the very origins of their race and world. Spenser likewise makes it clear at the outset of Canto Ten that he is recounting “the famous auncestryes / Of my most dreaded Soveraigne,” Queen Elizabeth; and although he temporarily breaks off at King Arthur, long before the story has reached his own time, later in the poem Spenser continues where he left off. In Book Three, Canto Three, the wizard Merlin offers a prediction of the future history of British kings from Arthur up to the Saxon invasions, with further glimpses of later developments culminating in the “royall Virgin” (III.iii.49). This method of

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recounting history in multiple and sometimes oblique forms suggests the closest single precedent for Spenser’s historical catalogues, the Aeneid. Three times Virgil narrates the history stretching from Aeneas to the time of the poem’s composition: once in a prophecy of Jupiter’s (Book 1), once in a pageant of unborn souls in the underworld (Book 6), and once in the ekphrastic depiction of historical scenes on Aeneas’ shield (Book 8). Spenser likewise begins his account after the fall of Troy, and he similarly divides it into three different forms: the written history of Britain up to Arthur, Merlin’s predicted history after Arthur, and the history of the House of Tudor (Elizabeth’s immediate ancestors) as shadowed forth allegorically in the history of Faerie Land read by Guyon. The last of these––Guyon’s “Antiquitee of Faery lond” (ix.60), the contents of which are related at the very end of Canto Ten––constitutes an idealized and simplified version of English history. The ancestors of the Faerie Queen, unlike those of the real Elizabeth, rule in unbroken and unproblematic succession; Elizabeth’s two siblings, Edward VI and Mary, whose troubled reigns immediately preceded hers, have no counterparts in the faerie history and are simply left out. But this version of events is more than counterbalanced by the struggles related in the “true” British history. Spenser’s chronicle is not primarily didactic: in contrast to most of the rest of the poem, in his history of the monarchy virtue often loses out to treachery. But this does not prevent Canto Ten from reinforcing some of the key motifs of Book Two. In the first place, although the moral is not illustrated with perfect consistency, many of the kings do fall due to intemperance. The wise Bladud, for instance, thrives when he uses his learning to advance the health of his subjects, but dies ignominiously when he passes the bounds of proper knowledge and tries to fly: “Yet he at last contending to excell / The reach of men, through flight into fond mischief fell” (x.26). Even more pertinent is the extended example of King Leyr and his three daughters. The daughters replay almost exactly the roles of the three sisters Guyon encounters in Canto Two: Cordelia recalls the earlier Medina, with her well-tempered hospitality, while her sisters are at once too lavish (in their praise of Leyr) and too stinting (in their “cheare,” x.30; compare the similar language in ii.34). Although in Shakespeare’s version of the same story Cordelia, too, could be accused of going to extremes by stubbornly refusing to express her full love for her father, in Spenser’s version her attitude is one of simple moderation: “But Cordeill said she lov’d him, as behoov’d” (x.28). The repetition here of the episode in Medina’s castle reminds the reader that the lessons of temperance have by no means been set aside but remain as central to history as to chivalry. The strongest connection between Canto Ten and the rest of Book Two, however, concerns the interrelation between internal and external

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struggles. Spenser places his British chronicle between Canto Nine––in which we tour the interior of Alma’s castle, the human body, where both appetites and emotions are kept in temperate control––and Canto Eleven, in which Arthur helps defeat the siege of disease and temptation. The successful repulse of external assault reflects and depends upon the maintenance of internal equilibrium. At a broader level, this paralleling of internal with external struggle constitutes the method of Spenser’s allegory: a psychological effort (such as the repression of anger) is represented as armed conflict (Guyon’s battle with Furor). For this reason, although Canto Ten may seem to stand out from the rest, being apparently neither allegorical nor primarily concerned with temperance, it in fact mirrors both the form and the content of the rest of the book. Twothirds of the way through the British history, the narrative turns from one of civil war and internecine betrayal to one of foreign invasion. Crucially, the latter depends upon the former. Julius Caesar, we are told, would never have become the first foreign conqueror of Britain had not a British prince traitorously rebelled against his uncle the king and helped the invaders: Ne had they [the Romans] footing found at last perdie, Had not Androgeus, false to native soyle, And envious of Uncles soveraintie, Betrayd his countrey unto forreine spoyle: Nought els, but treason, from the first this land did foyle. (x.48)

The Romans remain the chief enemy until history reaches the narrative present, when Arthur stands doubly poised—to unite Britain and redeem it from Roman rule, and to save Alma’s House of Temperance from siege. Thus Britain succumbs to external invasion due to internal dissension and will be liberated when it is once again united. Yet Spenser introduces a further complication, the last major link between Canto Ten and the rest of the book. The era of the Roman conquest, we are reminded, was also the era of the birth of Jesus––“What time th’eternall Lord in fleshly slime / Enwombed was” (x.50). This coincidence importantly reinforces a point that Spenser makes repeatedly in the last third of Book Two: temperance is essential, because intemperance makes one vulnerable to attack; but temperance by itself is insufficient without the aid of heavenly grace. Hence even the temperate Guyon requires a guardian angel to deliver him from his enemies at the beginning of Canto Eight. And by the same token Arthur cannot depend solely upon his internal resources to succeed against Maleger in Canto Eleven: “had not grace thee [Arthur]

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blest, thou shouldest not survive” (xi.30). In this respect, the historical narrative of Canto Ten recapitulates the lesson taught by the narrative of Book Two as a whole: temperance within ensures safety without, but only with the eventual assistance of grace from above.

5. The Legacy of Book Two The second book of The Faerie Queene significantly influenced the later history of English poetry, beginning with John Milton. In his defense of freedom of the press, Areopagitica (1644), Milton invokes Book Two to bolster his argument. We learn virtue, Milton claims, not by pretending that we are perfect but by encountering vice and resisting it—“which was the reason why our sage and serious poet Spenser, whom I dare be known to think a better teacher than Scotus or Aquinas, describing true temperance under the person of Guyon, brings him in with his palmer through the cave of Mammon and the bower of earthly bliss, that he might see and know, and yet abstain.”7 The Cave of Mammon (Canto Seven) later served Milton as a rich mine for the writing of Paradise Lost (1667): although the character of Milton’s Mammon does not much resemble Spenser’s, the descriptions of hell in Books 1 and 2 of Paradise Lost draw many of their details and even some of their phrasing from Spenser. But the story of Guyon exerted an even more significant influence on Milton’s subsequent epic, Paradise Regained (1671). Paradise Regained recounts the temptation of Jesus by Satan in the wilderness, as told in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke––the same biblical texts that underlie Guyon’s experience in Mammon’s cave. Jesus, of course, does not give in to the temptation; he does not so much as waver, and even Satan himself does not really expect him to. Hence Milton faces precisely the “challenge of temperance” described in Section 1 above: how does one compose a poem in which the hero, by definition, ought to be flawless and therefore threatens to become narratively inert? Milton’s response closely resembles Spenser’s, although he characteristically raises the stakes. Whereas Spenser gave vitality to his creation by making Guyon a “real” character (someone who “might see and know, and yet abstain”) as well as an embodiment of virtue, Milton presents a hero who is ontologically dual in an even grander sense: both man and God. Milton manages to

7 John Milton, Complete Poems and Major Prose, edited by Merritt Y. Hughes (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Co., 2003), pp. 728–29. Milton makes an intriguing mistake here: the Palmer does not in fact accompany Guyon in the Cave of Mammon, as critics beginning with Sirluck have noted with interest.

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write a masterpiece in which the hero’s actions consist entirely of inaction, and in this Spenser was his “better teacher”: Book Two provides a model of how to turn self-restraint into successful narrative. The subsequent influence of Book Two had more to do with its imagery than with its narrative method or its moral. It was not until a century and a half after the publication of The Faerie Queene that the Spenserian stanza was revived with any success.8 But in 1748 the Scottish poet James Thomson published The Castle of Indolence, a poem in two cantos that very capably adopts both the form and manner of The Faerie Queene. The Castle of Indolence itself amalgamates several Spenserian spaces, but it is most directly based on the Bower of Bliss that crowns Book Two: languid, deeply tempting, and yet eventually overthrown by a dauntless knight and his sidekick.9 Subsequently, Alfred Tennyson drew on both Thomson’s Castle and Spenser’s Bower for the brilliant Spenserian stanzas that introduce his poem “The Lotos-Eaters” (1832, revised 1842). Tennyson’s subject derives nominally from Homer, but his presentation is far closer to Spenser; the island of the lotos-eaters, like the Bower, presents an unsettling mixture of natural and unnatural appearances: “All round the coast the languid air did swoon, / Breathing like one that hath a weary dream. / Full-faced above the valley stood the moon; / And like a downward smoke, the slender stream / Along the cliff to fall and pause and fall did seem.” The single greatest offspring of the Bower of Bliss, however, is John Keats’s The Eve of St. Agnes (1820). In contrast to both Thomson and Tennyson, Keats does not present a wholly discrete locus, nor does he concern himself with either self-indulgence or false nature; rather, he seizes upon Spenser’s voyeurism. Throughout Canto Twelve, Spenser insists upon the pleasure of what is half hidden from the eye. One of the “wanton Maidens” tussling naked in the water, for instance, reveals half her body to Guyon, while “The rest hidd underneath, him more desirous made” (xii.66). Acrasia herself is clothed diaphanously—“arayd, or rather disarayd, / All in a vele of silke and silver thin, / That hid no whit her alablaster skin” (xii.77). Part of the provocativeness of the episode, moreover, comes from the fact that Guyon and the Palmer are also half hidden. In contrast to most chivalric heroes––including Arthur, who in the 8

This does not include the direct imitations of Spenser that followed after his death, such as Fletcher’s The Purple Island. 9 In 1800 William Wordsworth drew inspiration from a different aspect of the same episode. His blank-verse poem “Nutting,” in which a boyish excursion to gather hazelnuts turns into “merciless ravage,” leaving a “mossy bower / Deformed and sullied,” recalls the uncomfortable ambiguity of Guyon’s destruction of the Bower of Bliss.

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previous canto sallies forth openly and “in glitterand armes” (xi.17)––the heroes of the Bower of Bliss approach their climactic battle by “creeping”: “they creeping did at last display / That wanton Lady” (xii.76). (Milton imitates this moment in his depiction of the creeping Satan spying on Eve in Paradise Lost, Book 9.) In much the same way, Keats’s poem depends upon the excitement of a hidden viewer and a half-hidden object of desire. The voyeuristic thrill of Keats’s central tableau, in which Porphyro, secreted in a closet, gazes upon Madeline as she undresses, marks The Eve of St.Agnes as the closest heir of all to Spenser’s Bower of Bliss. Anon his heart revives: her vespers done, Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees; Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one; Loosens her fragrant boddice; by degrees Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees: Half-hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed, Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees, In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed, But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled. (The Eve of St. Agnes, stanza 26)

Ironically, then, the greatest legacy of Book Two to English poetry derives not from Spenser’s illustration of the virtue of temperance, but from his depiction of the vices and excesses that temperance overcomes.

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Title page to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23081).

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TO THE MOST MIGHTIE AND MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE ELIZABETH, BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND, FRANCE AND IRELAND DEFENDER OF THE FAITH &c.

Her most humble Seruant: Ed. Spenser

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The second Booke of the Faerie Queene. Contayning

The Legend of Sir Guyon. OR

Of Temperaunce. 1

Right well I wote most mighty Soveraine,1 That all this famous antique history, Of some2 th’aboundance of an ydle braine Will judged be, and painted forgery,3 Rather then matter of just memory, Sith none, that breatheth living aire, does know, Where is that happy land of Faery, Which I so much doe vaunt,4 yet no where show, But vouch antiquities, which no body can know.

2

But let that man with better sence advize,5 That of the world least part to us is red:6 And daily how through hardy enterprize, Many great Regions are discovered, Which to late age were never mentioned. Who ever heard of th’Indian Peru? Or who in venturous vessell measured The Amazons huge river now found trew? Or fruitfullest Virginia who did ever vew?7

3

Yet all these were when no man did them know, Yet have from wisest ages hidden beene: And later times thinges more unknowne shall show.

1 wote: know; Soveraine: Spenser addresses Queen Elizabeth I (reigned 1558– 1603), to whom his poem is dedicated. 2 Of some: by some people.

less than a century before Spenser published these lines in 1590. The Amazon is named after a mythical race of warrior women, and so the name is apt to Spenser’s point ––that fictions may yet prove true. The area of the east coast of North America called Virginia, which was just beginning to be explored by the English, was named after Queen Elizabeth, the Virgin Queen.

3

painted forgery: embellished fiction. vaunt: proclaim, exalt. 5 advize: consider. 6 red: known, revealed (past tense of rede). 7 I.e., who until lately. None of these New World locations was known in Europe until 4

3

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Why then should witlesse man so much misweene1 That nothing is but that which he hath seene? What if within the Moones fayre shining spheare What if in every other starre unseene Of other worldes he happily2 should heare? He wonder would much more, yet such to some appeare.3 4

Of Faerie lond yet if he more inquyre By certein signes here sett in sondrie place He may it fynd;4 ne let him then admyre5 But yield6 his sence to bee too blunt and bace That no’te without an hound fine footing trace.7 And thou, O fayrest Princesse under sky, In this fayre mirrhour maist behold thy face And thine owne realmes in lond of Faery And in this antique ymage thy great auncestry.

5

The which O pardon me thus to enfold In covert vele and wrap in shadowes light,8 That feeble eyes your glory may behold Which ells could not endure those beames bright But would bee dazled with exceeding light. O pardon and vouchsafe with patient eare The brave adventures of this faery knight The good Sir Guyon9 gratiously to heare, In whom great rule of Temp’raunce10 goodly doth appeare.

1

witlesse: ignorant; misweene: misjudge. happily: haply, perchance. 3 Some Renaissance philosophers speculated about the possibility of extraterrestrial life. 4 A reader who seeks Faerie Land will find it, since it is in part an allegory of contemporary England—a point Spenser makes explicit in lines 7–9. 5 admyre: wonder. 6 yield: grant, admit. 7 I.e., that cannot follow a trail without the help of a hound. 8 covert vele: covering veil; shadowes light: slight disguises, luminous allegories. 2

See “The Letter to Raleigh,” in which Spenser explains why he has presented his poem “thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises.” 9 Some version of this name (Guy, Guido) is common in chivalric romance; its specific relevance in this case is a matter of debate. “Guy” is an old synonym for “guide,” a word that often appears in this book near Guyon’s name. According to one medieval source, the word gyon means “wrestler”; at iv.8, Guyon wrestles to contain Furor. 10 See Introduction, especially Sections 1 and 3, on Spenser’s conception of the virtue of temperance.

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Canto One Guyon by Archimage abusd,1 the Redcrosse knight awaytes, Fyndes Mordant and Amavia slaine With pleasures poisoned baytes.

1

That conning Architect of cancred2 guyle, Whom Princes late displeasure left in bands,3 For falsed letters and suborned wyle,4 Soone as the Redcrosse knight he understands, To beene departed out of Eden landes, To serve againe his soveraine Elfin Queene,5 His artes he moves, and out of caytives6 handes Himselfe he frees by secret meanes unseene; His shackles emptie lefte, him selfe escaped cleene.

2

And forth he fares full of malicious mynd, To worken mischiefe and avenging woe, Where ever he that godly knight may fynd, His onely hart sore, and his onely foe, Sith Una now he algates7 must forgoe, Whom his victorious handes did earst8 restore To native crowne and kingdom late ygoe: 9 Where she enjoyes sure peace for evermore, As wetherbeaten ship arryv’d on happie shore.

1 abusd: deceived. Archimage, or Archimago, is the crafty wizard who causes most of the mischief in Book One by misleading the hero of that book, the Redcrosse knight (mentioned in the next line). 2 cancred: wicked. The “Architect of guyle” is Archimago (see previous note). At the end of Book One, which takes place in the land of Eden (see line 5), the king (or “Prince”) of Eden orders that Archimago be bound in chains (line 2) as punishment for his forged letters and trickery (line 3). 3

4 Archimago’s deceit (“wyle”) was procured (“suborned”) by Duessa (see 21.4n). 5 As we learn in Canto Ten, the men of Faerie Land are called “elves,” the women “fairies.” So the “Faerie Queene,” Gloriana, is also the “Elfin Queene,” since she is queen over the elves. 6

caytives: captors’. algates: altogether. Una is the heroine of Book One, a princess whose kingdom Redcrosse restores (lines 6–7). 7

8

bands: bonds, chains.

9

5

earst: earlier. late ygoe: recently.

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3

Him therefore now the object of his spight And deadly food he makes: him to offend1 By forged treason, or by open fight He seekes, of all his drifte the aymed end: Thereto his subtile engins2 he does bend His practick witt, and his fayre fyled tonge, With thousand other sleightes: for well he kend,3 His credit now in doubtfull ballaunce hong; For hardly could bee hurt, who was already stong.4

4

Still as he went, he craftie stales5 did lay, With cunning traynes him to entrap unwares, And privy spyals6 plast in all his way, To weete7 what course he takes, and how he fares; To ketch him at a vauntage in his snares. But now so wise and wary was the knight By tryall of his former harmes and cares, That he descryde, and shonned still his slight: The fish that once was caught, new bait wil hardly byte.

5

Nath’lesse th’Enchaunter would not spare his payne, In hope to win occasion to his will; Which when he long awaited had in vayne, He chaungd his mynd from one to other ill: For to all good he enimy was still. Upon the way him fortuned to meet, Fayre marching underneath a shady hill, A goodly knight, all armd in harnesse meete,8 That from his head no place appeared to his feete.

6

His carriage9 was full comely and upright, His countenance demure and temperate, But yett so sterne and terrible in sight, That cheard his friendes, and did his foes amate:10

1 food: prey; also feud, i.e., hostility (Hamilton); offend: harm. 2 engins: plots; also weapons, including his wit and his smooth tongue (line 6). 3 kend: knew. 4 I.e., someone already stung by a bee (i.e., Redcrosse) will be on his guard.

5

stales: decoys. privy spyals: secret spies. 7 weete: know. 8 harnesse meete: appropriate armor. 9 carriage: bearing, posture. 6

10

amate: daunt, dismay.

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7

He was an Elfin borne of noble state, And mickle worship1 in his native land, Well could he tourney and in lists debate,2 And knighthood tooke of good Sir Huons hand, When with king Oberon3 he came to Faerie land. 7

Him als accompanyd upon the way A comely Palmer,4 clad in black attyre, Of rypest yeares, and heares5 all hoarie gray, That with a staffe his feeble steps did stire,6 Least his long way his aged limbes should tire: And if by lookes one may the mind aread,7 He seemd to be a sage and sober syre, And ever with slow pace the knight did lead, Who taught his trampling steed with equall steps8 to tread.

8

Such whenas Archimago them did view, He weened well to worke some uncouth wyle,9 Eftsoones untwisting his deceiptfull clew,10 He gan11 to weave a web of wicked guyle, And with faire countenance and flattring style, To them approching, thus the knight bespake: “Fayre sonne of Mars,12 that seeke with warlike spoyle, And great atchiev’ments great your selfe to make, Vouchsafe to stay your steed for humble misers13 sake.”

9

He stayd his steed for humble misers sake, And badd tell on the tenor of his playnt;14 Who feigning then in every limb to quake,

1

mickle worship: great honor. tourney: joust in a tournament; debate: fight. The “lists” are the enclosures in which a knightly joust takes place. 3 According to x.76, Oberon is the previous ruler of Faerie Land, father of Gloriana. Sir Huon is not mentioned elsewhere in the poem. 4 Palmer: someone who has made a pilgrimage to Jerusalem––by implication, a holy or devout person. 5 heares: hairs. 2

6

stire: steer. aread: know. 8 I.e., at a pace equal to the Palmer’s. 9 uncouth wyle: new or unheard-of trick. 10 Eftsoones: immediately; clew: ball of thread. 11 gan: began. 12 Mars: Roman god of war. 13 misers: wretch’s. 14 badd: bade; tenor of his playnt: nature of his complaint. 7

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Through inward feare, and seeming pale and faynt With piteous mone his percing speach gan paynt;1 “Deare Lady how shall I declare thy cace, Whom late I left in languorous2 constraynt? Would God thy selfe now present were in place, To tell this ruefull tale; thy sight could win thee grace. 10

“Or rather would, O would it so had chaunst, That you, most noble Sir, had present beene, When that lewd rybauld3 with vyle lust advaunst Laid first his filthie hands on virgin cleene, To spoyle her dainty corps so faire and sheene,4 As on the earth, great mother of us all, With living eye more fayre was never seene, Of chastity and honour virginall: Witnes ye heavens, whom she in vaine to help did call.”

11

“How may it be,” said then the knight halfe wroth, “That knight should knighthood ever so have shent?”5 “None but that saw” (quoth he) “would weene for troth,6 How shamefully that Mayd he did torment. Her looser golden lockes he rudely rent, And drew her on the ground, and his sharpe sword, Against her snowy brest he fiercely bent,7 And threatned death with many a bloodie word; Tongue hates to tell the rest, that eye to see abhord.”

12

Therewith amoved from his sober8 mood, “And lives he yet” (said he) “that wrought this act, And doen the heavens afford him vitall9 food?” “He lives,” (quoth he) “and boasteth of the fact,10 Ne yet hath any knight his courage crackt.” “Where may that treachour11 then” (sayd he) “be found,

1

percing: piercing, poignant; paynt: describe, embellish. 2 languorous: woeful. 3 rybauld: lascivious person. 4 5

corps: body; sheene: bright, beautiful. shent: shamed.

6

weene for troth: believe it to be true. bent: aimed, pointed. 8 sober: calm. 9 vitall: life-giving. 10 fact: deed. 11 treachour: traitor, deceiver. 7

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9

Or by what meanes may I his footing tract?”1 “That shall I shew” (sayd he) “as sure, as hound The stricken Deare doth chaleng2 by the bleeding wound.” 13

He stayd not lenger talke, but with fierce yre And zealous haste away is quickly gone, To seeke that knight, where him that crafty Squyre3 Supposd to be. They do arrive anone, Where sate a gentle Lady all alone, With garments rent, and heare discheveled, Wringing her handes, and making piteous mone; Her swollen eyes were much disfigured, And her faire face with teares was fowly blubbered.4

14

The knight approching nigh, thus to her said, “Fayre Lady, through fowle sorrow ill bedight,5 Great pitty is to see you thus dismayd,6 And marre the blossom of your beauty bright: For thy7 appease your griefe and heavy plight, And tell the cause of your conceived8 payne: For if he live, that hath you doen despight,9 He shall you doe dew recompence agayne, Or els his wrong with greater puissance10 maintaine.”

15

Which when she heard, as in despightfull wise, She wilfully her sorrow did augment, And offred hope of comfort did despise:11 Her golden lockes most cruelly she rent, And scratcht her face with ghastly dreriment,12 Ne would she speake, ne see, ne yet be seene,

1

tract: trace. chaleng: bark or give a cry upon finding a scent. 3 Archimago is posing as the squire, or servant, of the lady who has supposedly been attacked. 4 blubbered: marred or swollen with weeping. 5 ill bedight: disarrayed. 2

6

dismayd: distressed; with a possible pun on “dis-maid”––i.e., deflowered (Hamilton). 7 For thy: therefore. 8 conceived: received, imagined. 9 despight: injury. 10 puissance: power. In other words, he will have to overcome Guyon in a duel. 11 despise: spurn. 12 ghastly dreriment: terrible grief.

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But hid her visage, and her head downe bent, Either for grievous shame, or for great teene,1 As if her hart with sorow had transfixed beene. 16

Till her that Squyre bespake, “Madame my liefe,2 For Gods deare love be not so wilfull bent, But doe vouchsafe now to receive reliefe, The which good fortune doth to you present. For what bootes it to weepe and to wayment,3 When ill is chaunst,4 but doth the ill increase, And the weake minde with double woe torment?” When she her Squyre heard speake, she gan appease Her voluntarie paine, and feele some secret ease.

17

Eftsoone she said, “Ah gentle trustie Squyre, What comfort can I wofull wretch conceave, Or why should ever I henceforth desyre, To see faire heavens face, and life not leave, Sith that false Traytour did my honour reave?”5 “False traytour certes”6 (said the Faerie knight) “I read the man, that ever would deceave A gentle Lady, or her wrong through might: Death were too little paine for such a fowle despight.

18

“But now, fayre Lady, comfort to you make, And read, who hath ye wrought this shamfull plight. That short7 revenge the man may overtake, Where so he be, and soone upon him light.” “Certes” (saide she) “I wote not, how he hight,8 But under him a gray steede he did wield, Whose sides with dapled circles weren dight;9 Upright he rode, and in his silver shield He bore a bloodie Crosse, that quartred all the field.”10

1

7

2

8

teene: woe. liefe: dear. 3 bootes: profits, helps; wayment: lament. 4 is chaunst: has happened. 5 reave: take away by force. 6 certes: certainly, indeed.

short: swift. hight: is called. 9 dight: adorned. 10 quartred all the field: divided the front of the shield into quarters.

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19

“Now by my head” (saide Guyon) “much I muse,1 How that same knight should do so fowle amis,2 Or ever gentle Damzell so abuse: For may I boldly say, he surely is A right good knight, and trew of word ywis:3 I present was, and can it witnesse well, When armes he swore, and streight did enterpris4 Th’adventure of the Errant damozell, In which he hath great glory wonne, as I heare tell.

20

“Nathlesse he shortly shall againe be tryde, And fairely quit him5 of th’imputed blame, Else be ye sure he dearely shall abyde,6 Or make you good amendment for the same: All wrongs have mendes, but no amendes of shame. Now therefore Lady, rise out of your paine, And see the salving of your blotted name.” Full loth she seemd thereto, but yet did faine, For she was inly glad her purpose so to gaine.

21

Her purpose was not such, as she did faine, Ne yet her person such, as it was seene, But under simple shew and semblant7 plaine Lurkt false Duessa8 secretly unseene, As a chaste Virgin, that had wronged beene: So had false Archimago her disguysd, To cloke her guile with sorrow and sad teene; And eke9 himselfe had craftily devisd To be her Squire, and do her service well aguisd.10

1

6

2

7

muse: wonder. amis: misdeed. 3 ywis: surely. 4 enterpris: undertake. The story of Redcrosse’s taking up arms and undertaking to help Una (the “Errant damozell”) is told in “The Letter to Raleigh.” 5 quit him: acquit himself, prove himself innocent.

11

abyde: suffer. semblant: appearance. 8 Duessa is the villainess of Book One. The opposite of Una, she embodies falseness and duplicity. 9

eke: also. aguisd: dressed, disguised.

10

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22

Her late forlorne and naked he had found,1 Where she did wander in waste wildernesse, Lurking in rockes and caves far under ground, And with greene mosse cov’ring her nakednesse, To hide her shame and loathly filthinesse, Sith her Prince Arthur of proud ornaments And borrowd beauty spoyld.2 Her nathelesse Th’enchaunter finding fit for his intents, Did thus revest, and deckt with dew habiliments.3

23

For all he did, was to deceive good knights, And draw them from pursuit of praise and fame, To slug4 in slouth and sensuall delights, And end their daies with irrenowmed5 shame. And now exceeding griefe him overcame, To see the Redcrosse thus advaunced hye; Therefore this craftie engine he did frame, Against his praise to stirre up enmitye Of such, as vertues like mote unto him allye.6

24

So now he Guyon guydes an uncouth7 way Through woods and mountaines, till they came at last Into a pleasant dale, that lowly lay Betwixt two hils, whose high heads overplast,8 The valley did with coole shade overcast; Through midst thereof a little river rold, By which there sate a knight with helme unlaste,9 Himselfe refreshing with the liquid cold, After his travell long, and labours manifold.

25

“Lo yonder he,” cryde Archimage alowd, “That wrought the shamefull fact, which I did shew, And now he doth himselfe in secret shrowd,10 To fly the vengeaunce for his outrage dew;

1

Arthur strips away Duessa’s false outward appearance and leaves her to flee naked into the wilderness at I.viii.46–50. 2 spoyld: despoiled, divested. 3 revest: reclothe; habiliments: garments. 4 slug: lie idly. 5 irrenowmed: unrenowned.

6 I.e., of those people who, having similar virtues, might naturally be his allies. 7 uncouth: unfamiliar, wild. 8 overplast: raised above. 9 helme unlaste: helmet unfastened. 10 shrowd: hide.

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13

But vaine: for ye shall dearely do him rew,1 So God ye speed, and send you good successe; Which we far off will here abide2 to vew.” So they him left, inflam’d with wrathfulnesse, That streight against that knight his speare he did addresse. 26

Who seeing him from far so fierce to pricke,3 His warlike armes about him gan embrace,4 And in the rest his ready speare did sticke; Tho when as still he saw him towards pace,5 He gan rencounter him in equall race:6 They bene ymett; both ready to affrap,7 When suddeinly that warriour gan abace8 His threatned speare, as if some new mishap Had him betide,9 or hidden danger did entrap.

27

And cryde, “Mercie Sir knight, and mercie Lord, For mine offence and heedelesse hardiment,10 That had almost committed crime abhord, And with reprochfull shame mine honour shent, Whiles cursed steele against that badge11 I bent, The sacred badge of my Redeemers death, Which on your shield is set for ornament”: But his fierce foe his steed could stay uneath,12 Who prickt with courage kene, did cruell battell breath.

28

But when he heard him speake, streight way he knew His errour, and himselfe inclyning13 sayd, “Ah deare Sir Guyon, well becommeth you, But me behoveth rather to upbrayd,14 Whose hastie hand so far from reason strayd, That almost it did haynous violence

1

8

2

9

do him rew: make him repent. abide: wait, stay behind. 3 pricke: spur his horse, gallop. 4

embrace: buckle. Tho: then; pace: ride. 6 rencounter: charge back at; race: rush. 7 affrap: strike. 5

abace: lower. him betide: befallen him. 10 hardiment: boldness. 11 I.e., the cross. 12 uneath: scarcely, with difficulty. 13 inclyning: turning aside, bowing. 14

I.e., it behooves you rather to upbraid me.

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On that fayre ymage of that heavenly Mayd,1 That decks and armes your shield with faire defence: Your court’sie takes on you anothers dew offence.” 29

So beene they both at one,2 and doen upreare Their bevers3 bright, each other for to greet; Goodly comportaunce4 each to other beare, And entertaine themselves with court’sies meet; Then saide the Redcrosse knight, “Now mote I weete,5 Sir Guyon, why with so fierce saliaunce,6 And fell7 intent ye did at earst me meet; For sith I know your goodly governaunce, Great cause, I weene, you guided, or some uncouth chaunce.”

30

“Certes” (said he) “well mote I shame to tell The fond encheason,8 that me hither led. A false infamous faitour9 late befell Me for to meet, that seemed ill bested,10 And playnd of grievous outrage, which he red A knight had wrought against a Ladie gent;11 Which to avenge, he to this place me led, Where you he made the marke of his intent, And now is fled, foule shame him follow, wher he went.”

31

So can12 he turne his earnest unto game, Through goodly handling and wise temperaunce. By this his aged Guide in presence came, Who soone as on that knight his eye did glaunce, Eftsoones of him had perfect cognizaunce,13 Sith him in Faery court he late avizd;14 And sayd, “Fayre sonne, God give you happy chaunce, And that deare Crosse uppon your shield devizd, Wherewith above all knights ye goodly seeme aguizd.15

1 Gloriana is painted on Guyon’s shield, as we learn at viii.43; see also v.11. 2 at one: in accord. 3 bevers: masks, faceguards. 4 comportaunce: demeanor, behavior. 5 weete: know. 6 saliaunce: assault. 7 fell: cruel.

8

fond encheason: foolish occasion. faitour: impostor. 10 ill bested: in a bad situation. 11 gent: gentle, noble. 12 can: did, is able to. 13 cognizaunce: recognition. 14 avizd: saw, viewed. 15 aguizd: dressed, equipped. 9

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32

“Joy may you have, and everlasting fame, Of late most hard atchiev’ment by you donne, For which enrolled is your glorious name In heavenly Regesters above the Sunne, Where you a Saint with Saints your seat have wonne:1 But wretched we, where ye have left your marke, Must now anew begin, like race to ronne; God guide thee, Guyon, well to end thy warke, And to the wished haven bring thy weary barke.”2

33

“Palmer,” him answered the Redcrosse knight, “His be the praise, that this atchiev’ment wrought, Who made my hand the organ of his might; More then goodwill to me attribute nought: For all I did, I did but as I ought. But you faire Sir, whose pageant next ensewes,3 Well mote yee thee,4 as well can wish your thought, That home ye may report5 thrise happy newes; For well ye worthy bene for worth and gentle thewes.”6

34

So courteous conge7 both did give and take, With right hands plighted,8 pledges of good will. Then Guyon forward gan his voyage make, With his blacke Palmer, that him guided still. Still he him guided over dale and hill, And with his steedy staffe did point his way: His race with reason, and with words his will, From fowle intemperaunce he ofte did stay, And suffred not in wrath his hasty steps to stray.

35

In this faire wize they traveild long yfere,9 Through many hard assayes,10 which did betide, Of which he honour still away did beare,

1 Redcrosse is equated with Saint George, patron saint of England, at I.x.61. 2 barke: boat. 3 A metapoetic moment: Redcrosse addresses Guyon as if he were a figure in an Elizabethan “pageant” or allegorical spectacle. The language of spectacle continues throughout this canto (e.g., 36.3, 40.9).

4

thee: thrive. report: bring back. 6 thewes: qualities, endowments. 7 conge: leave, farewell. 8 plighted: pledged, clasped. 9 yfere: together. 10 assayes: adventures. 5

15

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And spred his glory through all countryes wide. At last as chaunst them by a forest side To passe, for succour1 from the scorching ray, They heard a ruefull voice, that dearnly2 cride, With percing shriekes, and many a dolefull lay;3 Which to attend, awhile their forward steps they stay. 36

“But if that carelesse4 hevens” (quoth she) “despise The doome5 of just revenge, and take delight To see sad pageaunts of mens miseries, As bownd by them to live in lives despight,6 Yet can they not warne death from wretched wight.7 Come then, come soone, come sweetest death to me, And take away this long lent loathed light: Sharpe be thy wounds, but sweete the medicines be, That long captived soules from weary thraldome8 free.

37

“But thou, sweete Babe, whom frowning froward9 fate Hath made sad witnesse of thy fathers fall, Sith heven thee deignes to hold in living state, Long maist thou live, and better thrive withall, Then to thy lucklesse parents did befall: Live thou, and to thy mother dead attest,10 That cleare she dide from blemish criminall; Thy litle hands embrewd11 in bleeding brest Loe I for pledges leave. So give me leave to rest.”

38

With that a deadly shrieke she forth did throw, That through the wood reechoed againe, And after gave a grone so deepe and low, That seemd her tender heart was rent in twaine, Or thrild12 with point of thorough piercing paine; As gentle Hynd,13 whose sides with cruell steele

1

7

2

8

succour: protection. dearnly: mournfully. 3 lay: song, lament. 4 carelesse: uncaring. 5 doome: enforcement. 6 I.e., being obliged by the heavens to live on, though scorning life.

warne: keep away; wight: person. thraldome: bondage, captivity. 9 froward: adverse. 10 attest: bear witness. 11 embrewd: steeped, stained. 12 thrild: pierced. 13 Hynd: deer.

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Canto One

Through launched,1 forth her bleeding life does raine, Whiles the sad pang approching shee does feele, Braies out her latest breath, and up her eies doth seele.2 39

Which when that warriour heard, dismounting straict3 From his tall steed, he rusht into the thick, And soone arrived, where that sad pourtraict Of death and dolour lay, halfe dead, halfe quick,4 In whose white alabaster brest did stick A cruell knife, that made a griesly wownd, From which forth gusht a stream of goreblood thick, That all her goodly garments staind arownd, And into a deepe sanguine5 dide the grassy grownd.

40

Pitifull spectacle of deadly smart,6 Beside a bubling fountaine low she lay, Which shee increased with her bleeding hart, And the cleane waves with purple gore did ray;7 Als8 in her lap a lovely babe did play His cruell sport, in stead of sorrow dew; For in her streaming blood he did embay9 His litle hands, and tender joints embrew; Pitifull spectacle, as ever eie did vew.

41

Besides them both, upon the soiled gras The dead corse10 of an armed knight was spred, Whose armour all with blood besprincled was; His ruddy lips did smyle, and rosy red Did paint his chearefull cheekes, yett being ded,11 Seemd to have beene a goodly personage, Now in his freshest flowre of lusty hed,12 Fitt to inflame faire Lady with loves rage, But that fiers fate did crop the blossome of his age.

1

6

2

7

launched: pierced. Braies: brays, cries; seele: close; a term from falconry––a hawk’s eyes were “seeled” or stitched shut to help train it. 3 straict: straightaway, immediately. 4 quick: alive. 5 sanguine: red, blood-color.

smart: pain, suffering. ray: stain. 8 Als: and, also. 9

embay: plunge. corse: corpse. 11 yett being ded: even though dead. 12 lusty hed: vigor, lustiness. 10

17

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42

Whom when the good Sir Guyon did behold, His hart gan wexe as starke,1 as marble stone, And his fresh blood did frieze with fearefull cold, That all his sences seemd berefte attone:2 At last his mighty ghost3 gan deepe to grone, As Lion grudging4 in his great disdaine, Mournes inwardly, and makes to him selfe mone, Til ruth5 and fraile affection did constraine, His stout courage to stoupe,6 and shew his inward paine.

43

Out of her gored wound the cruell steel He lightly snatcht, and did the floodgate stop With his faire garment: then gan softly feel Her feeble pulse, to prove7 if any drop Of living blood yet in her veynes did hop; Which when he felt to move, he hoped faire To call backe life to her forsaken shop;8 So well he did her deadly wounds repaire, That at the last shee gan to breath out living aire.

44

Which he perceiving greatly gan rejoice, And goodly counsell, that for wounded hart Is meetest med’cine, tempred with sweete voice; “Ay me, deare Lady, which the ymage art Of ruefull pitty, and impatient9 smart, What direfull chaunce, armd with avenging fate, Or cursed hand hath plaid this cruell part, Thus fowle to hasten your untimely date;10 Speake, O dear Lady speake: help never comes too late.”

45

Therewith her dim eie-lids she up gan reare, On which the drery death did sitt, as sad As lump of lead, and made darke clouds appeare; But when as him all in bright armour clad Before her standing she espied had,

1

starke: stiff. attone: at once, together. 3 ghost: spirit. 4 grudging: grouching, growling. 5 ruth: pity. 2

6 His stout courage to stoupe: his brave spirit to stoop, or give way. 7 prove: try, determine. 8 I.e., the body, life’s place of business. 9 impatient: unbearable. 10 date: day of death.

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19

As one out of a deadly dreame affright,1 She weakely started, yet she nothing drad: Streight downe againe her selfe in great despight, She groveling2 threw to ground, as hating life and light. 46

The gentle knight her soone with carefull paine Uplifted light,3 and softly did uphold: Thrise he her reard, and thrise she sunck againe, Till he his armes about her sides gan fold, And to her said; “Yet if the stony cold Have not all seized on your frozen hart, Let one word fall that may your griefe unfold,4 And tell the secrete of your mortall smart; He oft finds present helpe, who does his griefe impart.”

47

Then casting up a deadly looke, full low Shee sight5 from bottome of her wounded brest, And after, many bitter throbs did throw With lips full pale and foltring6 tong opprest, These words she breathed forth from riven chest; “Leave, ah leave off, what ever wight7 thou bee, To lett8 a weary wretch from her dew rest, And trouble dying soules tranquilitee. Take not away now got,9 which none would give to me.”

48

“Ah far be it” (said he) “Deare dame fro mee, To hinder soule from her desired rest, Or hold sad life in long captivitee: For all I seeke, is but to have redrest The bitter pangs, that doth your heart infest.10 Tell then O Lady tell, what fatall priefe11 Hath with so huge misfortune you opprest: That I may cast to compas12 your reliefe, Or die with you in sorrow, and partake your griefe.”

1

I.e., like someone frightened awake by a nightmare. 2 groveling: prostrate. 3 light: lightly, gently. 4 unfold: reveal. 5 sight: sighed. 6 foltring: faltering.

7

wight: person, man. lett: keep, prevent. 9 now got: what I have now got (i.e., death). 10 infest: overwhelm. 11 priefe: trial. 12 cast to compas: attempt to accomplish. 8

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49

With feeble hands then stretched forth on hye, As heven accusing guilty of her death, And with dry drops congealed in her eye, In these sad wordes she spent her utmost1 breath: “Heare then, O man, the sorrowes that uneath My tong can tell, so far all sence they pas: Loe this dead corpse, that lies here underneath, The gentlest knight, that ever on greene gras Gay steed with spurs did pricke, the good Sir Mortdant2 was.

50

“Was, (ay the while, that he is not so now) My Lord my love; my deare Lord, my deare love, So long as hevens just with equall3 brow, Vouchsafed to behold us from above, One day when him high corage did emmove, As wont4 ye knightes to seeke adventures wilde, He pricked forth his puissaunt force to prove, Me then he left enwombed of this childe, This luckles childe, whom thus ye see with blood defild.

51

“Him fortuned (hard fortune ye may ghesse) To come, where vile Acrasia does wonne,5 Acrasia a false enchaunteresse, That many errant knightes hath fowle fordonne:6 Within a wandring Island, that doth ronne And stray in perilous gulfe, her dwelling is; Fayre Sir, if ever there ye travell, shonne The cursed land where many wend amis,7 And know it by the name; it hight the Bowre of blis.

52

“Her blis is all in pleasure and delight, Wherewith she makes her lovers dronken8 mad, And then with words and weedes9 of wondrous might,

1

utmost: final. “Mortdant” means “death-giving,” a name that turns out to be appropriate in stanza 55. His counterpart is Verdant, encountered in xii.82.

2

3 4

equall: fair, even. wont: tend, are accustomed to.

5

wonne: live. Acrasia, Greek for “incontinence” or “lack of control,” is a term from Aristotle; see Introduction, Section 3. 6

fordonne: destroyed. wend amis: go astray. 8 dronken: drunken, besotted. 9 weedes: herbs, potions. 7

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21

On them she workes her will to uses bad: My liefest1 Lord she thus beguiled had For he was flesh: (all flesh doth frayltie breed) Whom when I heard to beene so ill bestad Weake wretch I wrapt my selfe in Palmers weed,2 And cast to seek him forth through danger and great dreed.3 53

“Now had fayre Cynthia4 by even tournes Full measured three quarters of her yeare, And thrise three tymes had fild her crooked hornes, Whenas my wombe her burdein would forbeare,5 And bad me call Lucina6 to me neare. Lucina came: a manchild forth I brought: The woods, the Nymphes, my bowres, my midwives weare, Hard helpe at need. So deare7 thee babe I bought, Yet nought too dear I deemd, while so my deare I sought.

54

“Him so I sought, and so at last I fownd Where him that witch had thralled to her will, In chaines of lust and lewde desyres ybownd And so transformed from his former skill,8 That me he knew not, nether his owne ill; Till through wise handling and faire governaunce, I him recured9 to a better will, Purged from drugs of fowle intemperaunce: Then meanes I gan devise for his deliverance.

55

“Which when the vile Enchaunteresse perceiv’d, How that my Lord from her I would reprive,10 With cup thus charmd,11 him parting she deceivd; Sad verse, give death to him that death does give, And losse of love, to her that loves to live,

1

liefest: dearest. weed: dress. 3 dreed: peril. 4 Cynthia: the moon. The following lines say that the moon had measured nine months (“thrise three” full moons). 5 forbeare: give forth. 2

6

Lucina: goddess of childbirth. deare: costly; i.e., so much (pain) did you cost me. 8 skill: wit, ability. 9 recured: restored, recovered. 10 reprive: rescue. 11 charmd: enchanted, inscribed with verse. 7

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So soone as Bacchus with the Nymphe does lincke:1 So parted we and on our journey drive, Till comming to this well, he stoupt to drincke: The charme fulfild, dead suddeinly he downe did sincke. 56

“Which when I wretch––” Not one word more she sayd But breaking off, the end for want of breath, And slyding soft, as downe to sleepe her layd, And ended all her woe in quiet death. That seeing good Sir Guyon, could uneath From teares abstayne, for griefe his hart did grate,2 And from so heavie sight his head did wreath,3 Accusing fortune, and too cruell fate, Which plonged had faire Lady in so wretched state.

57

Then turning to his Palmer said, “Old syre Behold the ymage of mortalitie, And feeble nature cloth’d with fleshly tyre4 When raging passion with fierce tyranny Robs reason of her dew regalitie,5 And makes it servaunt to her basest part: The strong it weakens with infirmitie, And with bold furie armes the weakest hart; The strong through pleasure soonest falles, the weake through smart.”

58

“But temperaunce” (said he) “with golden squire6 Betwixt them both can measure out a meane, Nether to melt in pleasures whott desyre, Nor frye in hartlesse griefe and dolefull tene. Thrise happy man, who fares them both atweene.

1

The literal meaning of Acrasia’s curse is relatively clear: “him that death does give” is a translation of the name “Mortdant” (see 49.9n.), and “her that loves to live” of “Amavia” (who is named only in the argument to this canto and in ii.45). Bacchus is the god of wine, and “Nymphe” indicates water, since a nymph is the patron deity of a stream or fountain; the two “lincke” when Mortdant uses Acrasia’s cup to drink from the well. For a sample of the many interpretations of the curse, see Hamilton 1958, Fowler 1961 (who reads the well as repre-

senting baptism and Mortdant as representing the Flesh still sullied by Original Sin), and Miller 1966 (who reads this episode as a warning against going to extremes, either of indulgence or of abstinence). 2 grate: pain. 3 wreath: turn, cover. 4

tyre: attire. regalitie: sovereignty. 6 squire: square, an instrument of measurement and common emblem of temperance (Hamilton). 5

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23

But sith this wretched woman overcome Of anguish, rather then of crime hath bene, Reserve her cause to her eternall doome,1 And in the meane2 vouchsafe her honorable toombe.” 59

“Palmer,” quoth he, “death is an equall doome3 To good and bad, the commen Inne of rest; But after death the tryall is to come, When best shall bee to them, that lived best: But both alike, when death hath both supprest, Religious reverence doth buriall teene,4 Which who so wants,5 wants so much of his rest: For all so greet shame after death I weene, As selfe to dyen bad, unburied bad to beene.”

60

So both agree their bodies to engrave;6 The great earthes wombe they open to the sky, And with sad Cypresse seemely it embrave,7 Then covering with a clod their closed eye, They lay therein those corses tenderly, And bid them sleepe in everlasting peace. But ere they did their utmost obsequy, Sir Guyon more affection to increace, Bynempt a sacred vow, which none should ay releace.8

61

The dead knights sword out of his sheath he drew, With which he cutt a lock of all their heare,9 Which medling10 with their blood and earth, he threw Into the grave, and gan devoutly sweare; “Such and such evil God on Guyon reare, And worse and worse young Orphane be thy payne, If I or thou dew vengeance doe forbeare, Till guiltie blood her guerdon11 doe obtayne”: So shedding many teares, they closd the earth agayne.

1 I.e., reserve judgment on her case until the Last Judgment. Amavia committed suicide but was a victim, according to the Palmer, “of anguish, rather then of crime.” 2

meane: meantime. doome: fate, end. 4 teene: grant, afford (Hamilton). 5 wants: lacks. 3

6

engrave: bury. embrave: decorate. The cypress tree was a traditional emblem at funerals. 8 Bynempt: undertook; ay releace: ever undo. 9 heare: hair. 10 medling: mingling. 11 guerdon: reward. 7

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Canto Two Babes bloody handes may not be clensd, the face of golden Meane.1 Her sisters two Extremities: strive her to banish cleane.2

1

Thus when Sir Guyon with his faithful guyde Had with dew rites and dolorous lament The end of their sad Tragedie uptyde, The litle babe up in his armes he hent;3 Who with sweet pleasaunce and bold blandishment4 Gan smyle on them, that rather ought to weepe, As carelesse of his woe, or innocent5 Of that was doen, that ruth emperced deepe In that knightes hart, and wordes with bitter teares did steepe.

2

“Ah lucklesse babe, borne under cruell starre,6 And in dead parents balefull7 ashes bred, Full little weenest thou, what sorrowes are Left thee for porcion of thy livelyhed,8 Poore Orphane in the wide world scattered,9 As budding braunch rent from the native tree, And throwen forth, till it be withered: Such is the state of men: Thus enter we Into this life with woe, and end with miseree.”

3

Then soft him selfe inclyning on his knee Downe to that well, did in the water weene (So love does loath disdainefull nicitee)10 His guiltie handes from bloody gore to cleene;

1

6

golden Meane: Horace’s term (Odes, 2.10.5) for the temperate ideal. 2 cleane: utterly, entirely. 3 hent: took. 4 blandishment: friendly gesture.

In astrology, the position of the stars at one’s birth determines one’s fortunes. 7 balefull: sorrowful, harmful. 8 I.e., left to you as your life’s inheritance.

5

10

9

innocent: unaware.

24

scattered: cast forth. nicitee: fastidiousness.

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25

He washt them oft and oft, yet nought they beene For all his washing cleaner. Still he strove, Yet still the litle hands were bloody seene; The which him into great amaz’ment drove, And into diverse doubt his wavering wonder clove.1 4

He wist2 not whether blott of fowle offence Might not be purgd with water nor with bath; Or that high God, in lieu3 of innocence, Imprinted had that token of his wrath, To shew how sore bloodguiltinesse he hat’th; Or that the charme and veneme,4 which they dronck, Their blood with secret filth infected hath, Being diffused through the sencelesse tronck,5 That through the great contagion direful deadly stonck.

5

Whom thus at gaze, the Palmer gan to bord6 With goodly reason, and thus fayre bespake; “Ye bene right hard amated,7 gratious Lord, And of your ignorance great merveill make, Whiles cause not well conceived8 ye mistake. But know, that secret vertues9 are infusd In every fountaine, and in everie lake, Which who hath skill them rightly to have chusd, To proofe of passing wonders10 hath full often usd.

6

“Of those some were so from their sourse indewd11 By great Dame Nature, from whose fruitfull pap12 Their welheads spring, and are with moisture deawd;

1 clove: divided. The baby’s unwashable hands have given rise to many interpretations; they may represent the individual’s fallen nature, which remains even after baptism has washed away sin. The motif of frustrated hand-washing, which is also used by Shakespeare in Macbeth, returns in the figure of Pilate (vii.61). 2

wist: knew. lieu: place. Amavia intended her son’s bloody hands to be a pledge of her innocence (i.37). 4 charme and veneme: the curse and the potion. 3

5

sencelesse tronck: dead body (which has now begun to smell, line 9). 6 at gaze: staring about; bord: address, approach. 7 amated: confounded. 8 conceived: understood. 9 vertues: powers. 10 To proofe of passing wonders: with surpassingly wonderful effects. 11

indewd: endowed, filled with dew. Dame: a title of respect, like “Sir”; pap: breast. 12

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Which feedes each living plant with liquid sap, And filles with flowres fayre Floraes painted1 lap: But other some by guifte of later grace, Or by good prayers, or by other hap,2 Had vertue pourd into their waters bace,3 And thenceforth were renowmd, and sought from place to place. 7

“Such is this well, wrought by occasion straunge, Which to her Nymph4 befell. Upon a day, As she the woodes with bow and shaftes did raunge, The hartlesse Hynd and Robucke to dismay,5 Dan Faunus 6 chaunst to meet her by the way, And kindling fire at her faire burning eye, Inflamed was to follow beauties chace,7 And chaced her, that fast from him did fly; As Hynd from her, so she fled from her enimy.

8

“At last when fayling breath began to faint, And saw no meanes to scape, of shame affrayd, She set her downe to weepe for sore constraint,8 And to Diana9 calling lowd for ayde, Her deare besought, to let her die a mayd. The goddesse heard, and suddeine where she sate, Welling out streames of teares, and quite dismayd With stony feare of that rude rustick mate, Transformd her to a stone from stedfast virgins state.10

1

painted: decorated, colorful. Flora is goddess of flowers. 2 hap: chance. 3 bace: ordinary; i.e., not naturally magical. 4

See i.55.6n. dismay: conquer, kill. “Hynd” and “Robucke” are the female and male red deer; “hartlesse” means frightened, but “hart” is also another word for buck. 6 Dan: a title of respect (Latin Dominus, Spanish Don); Faunus: classical god of woodlands. 5

7

This line does not rhyme. Some editors have suggested changing the final word to “prey,” but this is one of several instances where Spenser seems deliberately to have disappointed the reader’s ear; see also ii.42.6; iii.28.7; viii.29.7. 8 sore constraint: bitter compulsion. 9 Diana: goddess both of the hunt and of chastity. 10 This transformation is reminiscent of several in Ovid’s Metamorphoses, especially those of Daphne, Arethusa, and Niobe (1.525ff; 5.595ff; 6.301ff.).

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9

“Lo now she is that stone, from whose two heads, As from two weeping eyes, fresh streames do flow, Yet1 colde through feare, and old conceived dreads; And yet the stone her semblance seemes to show, Shapt like a maide, that such ye may her know; And yet her vertues in her water byde:2 For it is chaste and pure, as purest snow, Ne lets her waves with any filth be dyde, But ever like her selfe unstayned hath beene tryde.3

10

“From thence it comes, that this babes bloody hand May not be clensd with water of this well: Ne certes Sir strive you it to withstand, But let them still be bloody, as befell, That they his mothers innocence may tell, As she bequeathd in her last testament; That as a sacred Symbole it may dwell In her sonnes flesh, to mind revengement,4 And be for all chaste Dames an endlesse moniment.”5

11

He hearkned to his reason, and the childe Uptaking, to the Palmer gave to beare; But his sad6 fathers armes with blood defilde, An heavie load himselfe did lightly reare, And turning to that place, in which whyleare7 He left his loftie steed with golden sell,8 And goodly gorgeous barbes,9 him found not theare. By other accident that earst befell, He is convaide,10 but how or where, here fits not tell.

12

Which when Sir Guyon saw, all were he11 wroth, Yet algates12 mote he soft himselfe appease, And fairely fare on foot, how ever loth;

1

7

2

8

Yet: still. byde: abide, remain. 3 tryde: proven. 4 mind revengement: remind him of revenge. 5 moniment: symbol, reminder, warning. 6 sad: unfortunate.

27

whyleare: earlier. sell: saddle. 9 barbes: protective trappings for a warhorse. 10 convaide: stolen. We learn the details in Canto Three. 11 all were he: although he was. 12 algates: nevertheless.

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His double burden did him sore disease.1 So long they traveiled with litle ease, Till that at last they to a Castle came, Built on a rocke2 adjoyning to the seas, It was an auncient worke of antique fame, And wondrous strong by nature, and by skilfull frame.3 13

Therein three sisters dwelt of sundry4 sort, The children of one syre by mothers three; Who dying whylome5 did divide this fort To them by equall shares in equall fee:6 But stryfull mind, and diverse qualitee Drew them in partes, and each made others foe: Still did they strive, and daily disagree; The eldest did against the youngest goe, And both against the middest meant to worken woe.7

14

Where when the knight arriv’d, he was right well Receiv’d, as knight of so much worth became, Of second sister, who did far excell The other two; Medina 8 was her name, A sober sad, and comely courteous Dame; Who rich arayd, and yet in modest guize,9 In goodly garments, that her well became, Fayre marching forth in honorable wize,10 Him at the threshold mett, and well did enterprize.11

15

She led him up into a goodly bowre, And comely courted12 with meet modestie, Ne in her speach, ne in her haviour, Was lightnesse13 seene, or looser vanitie,

1

disease: annoy, discomfort. Cf. Matt. 7.24, the wise man who builds his home upon a rock (Hamilton). 3 frame: construction, design. 4 sundry: different. 5 whylome: formerly, before. 6 in equall fee: with equal right. 7 worken woe: do harm, cause trouble. 2

8

Medina: the name comes from the Latin root meaning “middle.” Hence, she is both decorously grave (“sober sad”) and pleasantly welcoming (“comely courteous”).

9

guize: apparel, manner. wize: way. 11 enterprize: take care of. 12 courted: treated with courtesy. 13 lightnesse: frivolity. 10

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29

But gratious womanhood, and gravitie, Above the reason of her youthly yeares: Her golden lockes she roundly did uptye In breaded tramels,1 that no looser heares Did out of order stray about her daintie eares. 16

Whilest she her selfe thus busily did frame,2 Seemely to entertaine her new-come guest, Newes hereof to her other sisters came, Who all this while were at their wanton rest, Accourting3 each her frend with lavish fest: They were two knights of perelesse puissaunce, And famous far abroad for warlike gest,4 Which to these Ladies love did countenaunce,5 And to his mistresse each himselfe strove to advaunce.

17

He that made love unto the eldest Dame, Was hight Sir Huddibras,6 an hardy man; Yet not so good of deedes, as great of name, Which he by many rash adventures wan,7 Since errant armes to sew8 he first began; More huge in strength, then wise in workes he was, And reason with foole-hardize over ran; Sterne melancholy did his courage pas,9 And was for terrour more, all armd in shyning bras.

18

But he that lov’d the youngest, was Sansloy,10 He that faire Una late fowle outraged, The most unruly, and the boldest boy,

1

breaded tramels: braided plaits. frame: occupy. 3 Accourting: courting, entertaining. 4 gest: deed. 5 countenaunce: display, proffer. 6 This is also the name of a peaceful king of Britain (see x.25), but here it has negative connotations. The word seems to be a mixture of the Greek hubris (overbearing pride) and “brass” (of which his armor is made, 2

line 9). In 1 Cor. 13.1, brass is depicted as being loud but empty. Samuel Butler took the name for the Puritan antihero of his satiric poem, Hudibras (1663–78). 7 wan: won. 8 sew: pursue. 9 melancholy: bad humor, anger; pas: outweigh, exceed. 10 Sansloy: French for “lawless.” He tried to rape Una in I.vi, as recalled in line 2.

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That ever warlike weapons menaged,1 And to all lawlesse lust encouraged, Through strong opinion of his matchlesse might: Ne ought he car’d, whom he endamaged2 By tortious3 wrong, or whom bereav’d of right. He now this Ladies Champion chose for love to fight. 19

These two gay knights, vowd to so diverse loves, Each other does envy with deadly hate, And daily warre against his foeman moves,4 In hope to win more favour with his mate, And th’others pleasing service to abate,5 To magnifie his owne. But when they heard, How in that place straunge knight arrived late, Both knightes and ladies forth right angry far’d, And fercely unto battell sterne themselves prepar’d.

20

But ere they could proceede unto the place, Where he abode, themselves at discord fell, And cruell combat joynd in middle space: With horrible assault, and fury fell, They heapt huge strokes, the scorned life to quell,6 That all on uprore from her settled seat, The house was raysd, and all that in did dwell; Seemd that lowde thunder with amazement great Did rend the ratling skyes with flames of fouldring7 heat.

21

The noyse thereof cald forth that straunger knight, To weet, what dreadfull thing was there in hand; Where when as two brave knightes in bloody fight With deadly rancour he enraunged fond,8 He sunbroad shield about his wrest he bond,9 And shyning blade unsheathd, with which he ran

1

6

2

7

menaged: wielded. endamaged: hurt. 3 tortious: injurious; from the French tort (wrong), a legal term. 4 moves: stirs up, starts. 5 abate: diminish.

quell: extinguish. fouldring: like lightning. 8 enraunged fond: found drawn up for battle. 9 wrest: wrist; bond: bound.

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31

Unto that stead,1 their strife to understond; And at his first arrivall, them began With goodly meanes to pacifie, well as he can. 22

But they him spying, both with greedy2 forse Attonce upon him ran, and him beset With strokes of mortall steele without remorse, And on his shield like yron sledges3 bet: As when a Beare and Tygre being met In cruell fight on lybicke Ocean4 wide, Espye a traveiler with feet surbet,5 Whom they in equall pray hope to divide, They stint6 their strife, and him assayle on everie side.

23

But he, not like a weary traveilere, Their sharp assault right boldly did rebut, And suffred7 not their blowes to byte him nere, But with redoubled buffes them backe did put: Whose grieved mindes, which choler did englut,8 Against themselves turning their wrathfull spight, Gan with new rage their shieldes to hew and cut; But still when Guyon came to part their fight, With heavie load on him they freshly gan to smight.

24

As a tall ship tossed in troublous seas, Whom raging windes threatning to make the pray Of the rough rockes, doe diversly disease,9 Meetes two contrarie billowes by the way, That her on either side doe sore assay,10 And boast11 to swallow her in greedy grave; Shee scorning both their spights, does make wide way, And with her brest breaking the fomy wave, Does ride on both their backs, and faire her self doth save.

1

stead: place. greedy: eager. 3 sledges: hammers. 4 lybicke Ocean: i.e., the Lybian Desert. 5 surbet: bruised, footsore. 2

6

stint: stop, cease.

7

suffred: permitted. choler did englut: anger did flood. “Choler,” or bile, like melancholy (above, 17.8), is one of the body’s four humors. 9 disease: disturb, trouble. 10 assay: assail. 11 boast: threaten. 8

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25

So boldly he him beares, and rusheth forth Betweene them both, by conduct of 1 his blade. Wondrous great prowesse and heroick worth He shewd that day, and rare ensample2 made, When two so mighty warriours he dismade: Attonce he wards and strikes, he takes and paies, Now forst to yield, now forcing to invade,3 Before, behind, and round about him laies: So double was his paines, so double be his praise.

26

Straunge sort of fight, three valiaunt knights to see Three combates joine in one, and to darraine4 A triple warre with triple enmitee, All for their Ladies froward5 love to gaine, Which gotten was but hate. So love does raine In stoutest6 minds, and maketh monstrous warre; He maketh warre, he maketh peace againe, And yett his peace is but continuall jarre:7 O miserable men, that to him subject arre.

27

Whilst thus they mingled were in furious armes, The faire Medina with her tresses torne, And naked brest, in pitty of their harmes, Emongst them ran, and falling them beforne, Besought them by the womb, which them had born, And by the loves, which were to them most deare, And by the knighthood, which they sure had sworn, Their deadly cruell discord to forbeare, And to her just conditions of faire peace to heare.8

28

But her two other sisters standing by, Her lowd gainsaid, and both their champions bad9 Pursew the end of their strong enmity, As10 ever of their loves they would be glad. Yet she with pitthy11 words and counsell sad,

1

by conduct of: by use of, following. ensample: example. 3 forcing to invade: gathering to attack. 4 darraine: wage. 5 froward: contrary, perverse. 2

6

stoutest: strongest, boldest.

7

jarre: discord. heare: listen, attend. 9 bad: bade, ordered. 10 As: if. 11 pitthy: pithy, to the point; but the spelling suggests a hint of pity. 8

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33

Still strove their stubborne rages to revoke,1 That at the last suppressing fury mad, They gan abstaine from dint of direfull stroke, And hearken to the sober speaches, which she spoke. 29

“Ah puissaunt Lords, what cursed evill Spright, Or fell Erinnys 2 in your noble harts, Her hellish brond3 hath kindled with despight, And stird you up to worke your wilfull smarts? Is this the joy of armes? be these the parts4 Of glorious knighthood, after blood to thrust,5 And not regard dew right and just desarts? Vaine is the vaunt, and victory unjust, That more to mighty hands, then rightfull cause doth trust.

30

“And were their rightfull cause of difference, Yet were not better, fayre it to accord, Then with bloodguiltinesse to heape offence, And mortal vengeaunce joyne to crime abhord? O fly from wrath, fly, O my liefest Lord: Sad be the sights, and bitter fruites of warre, And thousand furies wait on wrathfull sword; Ne ought6 the praise of prowesse more doth marre, Then fowle revenging rage, and base contentious jarre.

31

“But lovely7 concord, and most sacred peace Doth nourish vertue, and fast friendship breeds; Weake she makes strong, and strong thing does increace, Till it the pitch of highest praise exceeds: Brave be her warres, and honorable deeds, By which she triumphes over yre and pride, And winnes an Olive girlond for her meeds:8 Be therefore, O my deare Lords, pacifide, And this misseeming discord meekely lay aside.”

1

5

2

6

revoke: call back, restrain. Erinnys: Furies, classical goddesses of strife and retribution. 3 brond: firebrand, torch. 4 parts: attributes.

thrust: stab, thirst. ought: aught, anything. 7 lovely: fair, loving. 8 meeds: reward. The olive branch or garland is a symbol of peace.

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32

Her gracious words their rancour did appall,1 And suncke so deepe into their boyling brests, That downe they lett their cruell weapons fall, And lowly did abase their lofty crests To her faire presence, and discrete behests. Then she began a treaty to procure,2 And stablish termes betwixt both3 their requests, That as a law for ever should endure; Which to observe in word of knights they did assure.

33

Which to confirme, and fast to bind their league, After their weary sweat and bloody toile, She them besought, during their quiet treague,4 Into her lodging to repaire5 a while, To rest themselves, and grace to reconcile.6 They soone consent: so forth with her they fare, Where they are well receivd, and made to spoile7 Themselves of soiled armes, and to prepare Their minds to pleasure, and their mouths to dainty fare.

34

And those two froward sisters, their faire loves Came with them eke, all were they wondrous loth, And fained cheare, as for the time behoves, But could not colour yet so well the troth,8 But that their natures bad appeard in both: For both did at their second sister grutch,9 And inly grieve, as doth an hidden moth The inner garment fret, not th’utter10 touch; One thought her cheare11 too litle, th’other thought too mutch.

35

Elissa12 (so the eldest hight) did deeme Such entertainment base, ne ought would eat, Ne ought would speake, but evermore did seeme

1

7

2

8

appall: appease, overcome. procure: arrange. 3 both: sometimes used, as here, to indicate more than two elements. 4 treague: truce. 5 repaire: retire. 6 grace to reconcile: to restore good relations.

spoile: divest. colour: disguise; troth: truth. 9 grutch: grouch, grumble. 10 th’utter: the outer. 11 cheare: welcome, food. 12

Elissa: the name comes from the Greek for “too little”: she takes too little pleasure in things and is therefore always angry or unsatisfied.

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As discontent for want of merth or meat;1 No solace could her Paramour2 intreat Her once to show, ne court,3 nor dalliaunce, But with bent lowring browes, as she would threat, She scould, and frownd with froward countenaunce, Unworthy of faire Ladies comely governaunce. 36

But young Perissa4 was of other mynd, Full of disport, still5 laughing, loosely light, And quite contrary to her sisters kynd;6 No measure7 in her mood, no rule of right, But poured out in pleasure and delight; In wine and meats she flowd above the banck, And in excesse exceeded her owne might; In sumptuous tire she joyd her selfe to pranck,8 But of her love too lavish (litle have she thanck.)

37

Fast by her side did sitt the bold Sansloy, Fitt mate for such a mincing mineon,9 Who in her loosenesse tooke exceeding joy; Might not be found a francker franion,10 Of her leawd parts to make companion: But Huddibras, more like a Malecontent, Did see and grieve at his bold fashion; Hardly could he endure his hardiment,11 Yett still he satt, and inly did him selfe torment.

38

Betwixt them both the faire Medina sate With sober grace, and goodly carriage: With equall measure she did moderate The strong extremities of their outrage,12

1

meat: food in general. solace: comfort, pleasure; Paramour: lover. 3 court: courtesy. 4 Perissa: from the Greek for “too much.” She is the opposite of her sister; see 35.1n. 5 disport: playfulness; still: always. 6 kynd: nature. 2

7

measure: moderation. pranck: dress up. 9 mincing mineon: dainty little pet. 10 francker franion: more promiscuous paramour. 8

11 12

hardiment: presumptuous behavior. outrage: excess.

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That forward paire1 she ever would asswage, When they would strive dew reason to exceed; But that same froward twaine would accorage,2 And of her plenty adde unto their need: So kept she them in order, and her selfe in heed.3 39

Thus fairely shee attempered her feast, And pleasd them all with meete satiety: At last when lust4 of meat and drinke was ceast, She Guyon deare besought of curtesie, To tell from whence he came through jeopardy, And whither now on new adventure bownd. Who with bold grace, and comely gravity, Drawing to him the eies of all arownd, From lofty siege5 began these words aloud to sownd.

40

“This thy demaund, O Lady, doth revive Fresh memory in me of that great Queene, Great and most glorious virgin Queene alive, That with her soveraine powre, and scepter shene6 All Faery lond does peaceably sustene. In widest Ocean she her throne does reare, That over all the earth it may be seene; As morning Sunne her beames dispredden7 cleare, And in her face faire peace, and mercy doth appeare.

41

“In her the richesse of all heavenly grace, In chiefe degree are heaped up on hye: And all that els this worlds enclosure bace, Hath great or glorious in mortall eye, Adornes the person of her Majestye;8 That men beholding so great excellence,

1

forward paire: excessive couple, i.e., Perissa and Sansloy, as opposed to the “froward twaine,” Elissa and Huddibras (line 7). 2 accorage: encourage, hearten. 3

in heed: in position of responsibility. lust: desire. This line repeats a traditional epic formula, common in Homer. 4

5 siege: seat. Medina’s request and Guyon’s response resemble those of Dido and Aeneas in Virgil, Aeneid, 1.753–2.6. 6 shene: bright. 7 dispredden: spread out. 8 Gloriana has both all virtues of heaven (lines 1–2) and all the beautiful things that the terrestrial globe (“this worlds enclosure bace”) can supply.

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And rare perfection in mortalitye, Doe her adore with sacred reverence, As th’Idole1 of her makers great magnificence. 42

“To her I homage and my service owe, In number of the noblest knightes on ground, Mongst whom on me she deigned to bestowe Order of Maydenhead,2 the most renownd, That may this day in all the world be found, An yearely solemne feast she wontes to make3 The day that first doth lead the yeare around; To which all knights of worth and courage bold Resort, to heare of straunge adventures to be told.4

43

“There this old Palmer shewd himselfe that day, And to that mighty Princesse did complaine Of grievous mischiefes, which a wicked Fay5 Had wrought, and many whelmd in deadly paine, Whereof he crav’d redresse. My Soveraine, Whose glory is in gracious deeds, and joyes Throughout the world her mercy to maintaine, Eftsoones devisd redresse for such annoyes;6 Me all unfitt for so great purpose she employes.

44

“Now hath faire Phebe7 with her silver face Thrise seene the shadowes of the neather world,8 Sith last I left that honorable place, In which her roiall presence is entrold;9 Ne ever shall I rest in house nor hold,10 Till I that false Acrasia have wonne;

1

5

2

6

Idole: image. The “Order of Maydenhead” is based on the Order of the Garter, Britain’s highest order of knighthood, instituted in 1348. 3 On the lack of rhyme, see ii.7.7n. 4 See “The Letter to Raleigh,” where this tradition is described. In the Letter, the Palmer comes to Gloriana’s feast already bearing the orphaned infant, a version of the story that conflicts with Canto One.

Fay: fairy, witch. annoyes: harms. 7 Phebe: the moon. 8 neather world: under (nether) world. In other words, three lunar cycles, or months, have passed since Guyon began his quest; cf. i.53. 9 entrold: enrolled, encircled (Hamilton). 10

hold: stronghold, refuge.

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Of whose fowle deedes, too hideous to bee told I witnesse am, and this their wretched sonne, Whose wofull parents she hath wickedly fordonne.”1 45

“Tell on, fayre Sir,” said she, “that dolefull tale, From which sad ruth does seeme you to restraine, That we may pitty such unhappie bale,2 And learne from pleasures poyson to abstaine: Ill by ensample good doth often gayne.” Then forward he his purpose gan pursew, And told the story of the mortall payne, Which Mordant and Amavia did rew;3 As with lamenting eyes him selfe did lately vew.

46

Night was far spent, and now in Ocean deep Orion, flying fast from hissing snake,4 His flaming head did hasten for to steep,5 When of his pitteous tale he end did make; Whilst with delight of that he wisely spake, Those guestes beguyled, did beguyle6 their eyes Of kindly sleepe, that did them overtake. At last when they had markt the chaunged skyes, They wist their houre was spent; then each to rest him hyes.7

1

fordonne: killed. bale: woe, torment. 3 rew: regret, suffer. Amavia died at i.56 without telling Guyon her name. 4 The constellation Orion, the hunter, sets 2

to the west while Scorpio, the scorpion or snake, rises in the east. 5 steep: plunge (in the ocean). 6 beguyle: deprive. 7 hyes: hurries.

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Canto Three Vaine Braggadocchio getting Guyons horse is made the scorne Of knighthood trew, and is of fayre Belphoebe fowle forlorne.1

1

Soone as the morrow2 fayre with purple beames Disperst the shadowes of the misty night, And Titan3 playing on the eastern streames, Gan cleare the deawy ayre with springing light, Sir Guyon mindfull of his vow yplight,4 Uprose from drowsie couch,5 and him addrest Unto the journey which he had behight:6 His puissaunt armes about his noble brest, And many-folded7 shield he bound about his wrest.

2

Then taking Congè of that virgin pure,8 The bloody-handed babe unto her truth9 Did earnestly committ, and her conjure,10 In vertuous lore11 to traine his tender youth, And all that gentle noriture ensueth:12 And that so soone as ryper yeares he raught,13 He might for memory of that dayes ruth, Be called Ruddymane,14 and thereby taught, T’avenge his Parents death on them, that had it wrought.

1

6

fowle forlorne: disgracefully overcome or left behind. Belphoebe, who is not otherwise named in this canto, figures more largely in Books Three and Four. She is named after Phoebe, or Diana, the virgin goddess of the moon and of the hunt (see ii.8.4 and n.). Spenser says in “The Letter to Raleigh” that she reflects in part on Queen Elizabeth, the Virgin Queen. 2 morrow: morning. 3 Titan: the sun. 4 yplight: pledged. 5 couch: bed.

behight: undertaken. many-folded: having many layers (of metal). 8 Congè: leave, farewell; virgin pure: i.e., Medina. 9 unto her truth: into her trust. 10 conjure: enjoin. 11 lore: learning. 12 I.e., and all that pertains to noble upbringing. 7

13

ryper: more mature; raught: reached. Ruddymane means “bloody-handed” (as in line 2 above).

14

39

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3

So forth he far’d, as now befell, on foot, Sith his good steed is lately from him gone; Patience perforce:1 helplesse what may it boot To frett for anger, or for griefe to mone? His Palmer now shall foot no more alone: So fortune wrought, as under greene woodes syde He lately heard that dying Lady grone,2 He left his steed without, and speare besyde, And rushed in on foot to ayd her, ere she dyde.

4

The whyles a losell3 wandring by the way, One that to bountie4 never cast his mynd, Ne thought of honour ever did assay5 His baser brest, but in his kestrell kynd6 A pleasing vaine of glory7 he did fynd, To which his flowing toung, and troublous spright8 Gave him great ayd, and made him more inclynd: He that brave steed there finding ready dight, Purloynd both steed and speare, and ran away full light.9

5

Now gan his hart all swell in jollity, And of him selfe great hope and help conceiv’d,10 That puffed up with smoke of vanity, And with selfe-loved personage11 deceiv’d, He gan to hope, of men to be receiv’d For such, as he him thought, or faine would bee: But for in court gay portaunce12 he perceiv’d, And gallant shew to be in greatest gree,13 Eftsoones to court he cast t’advaunce his first degree.14

1

perforce: of necessity. Amavia, at i.35. What follows is a flashback to show how Guyon lost his horse. 3 losell: scoundrel. 4 bountie: beneficence, valor. 5 assay: engage. 6 baser: very base; his kestrell kynd: his nature, like a bird of prey. 7 glory: pride, boasting. The phrase as a whole suggests “vaingloriousness.” 2

8

troublous spright: unruly spirit. light: swiftly, happily. 10 great hope and help conceiv’d: imagined great possibility and capability. 11 selfe-loved personage: love of his own image or impersonation (Hamilton). 12 for: as, since; portaunce: demeanor. 13 gree: dignity, favor. 14 degree: step, stage. 9

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6

And by the way he chaunced to espy One sitting ydle on a sunny banck, To whom avaunting in great bravery,1 As Peacocke, that his painted plumes doth pranck,2 He smote his courser3 in the trembling flanck, And to him threatned his hart-thrilling speare: The seely man seeing him ryde so ranck,4 And ayme at him, fell flatt to ground for feare, And crying “Mercy” loud, his pitious handes gan reare.

7

Thereat the Scarcrow wexed5 wondrous prowd, Through fortune of his first adventure fayre, And with big thundring voice revyld6 him lowd; “Vile Caytive, vassall7 of dread and despayre, Unworthie of the commune breathed ayre, Why livest thou, dead dog, a lenger day,8 And doest not unto death thy selfe prepayre. Dy, or thy selfe my captive yield for ay;9 Great favour I thee graunt, for aunswere thus to stay.”

8

“Hold, O deare Lord, hold your dead-doing hand,” Then loud he cryde, “I am your humble thrall.” “Ah wretch” (quoth he) “thy destinies withstand My wrathfull will, and doe for mercy call. I give thee life: therefore prostrated fall, And kisse my stirrup; that thy homage bee.” The Miser threw him selfe, as an Offall,10 Streight at his foot in base humilitee, And cleeped him his liege, to hold of him in fee.11

1

avaunting: advancing, boasting; bravery: showiness, boldness. 2 pranck: display. 3 courser: warhorse. 4 seely: innocent, helpless; ranck: swiftly, impetuously. 5 wexed: waxed, grew. Braggadocchio is a scarecrow in that he seems intimidating only because of his accoutrements.

6

41

revyld: insulted. vassall: subject, slave. 8 a lenger day: one day more. 9 ay: ever. 10 Miser: wretch; Offall: piece of refuse, rubbish. 11 I.e., and called him his master to take possession of him. 7

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9

So happy peace they made and faire accord: Eftsoones this liegeman1 gan to wexe more bold, And when he felt the folly of his Lord, In his owne kind he gan him selfe unfold:2 For he was wylie witted, and growne old In cunning sleightes and practick knavery.3 From that day forth he cast for to uphold His ydle humour4 with fine flattery, And blow the bellowes to his swelling vanity.

10

Trompart fitt man for Braggadochio,5 To serve at court in view of vaunting eye; Vaineglorious man, when fluttring wind does blow In his light winges, is lifted up to skye: The scorne6 of knighthood and trew chevalrye, To thinke without desert of gentle deed, And noble worth to be advaunced hye: Such prayse is shame; but honour vertues meed7 Doth beare the fayrest flowre in honourable seed.8

11

So forth they pas, a well consorted payre, Till that at length with Archimage they meet: Who seeing one that shone in armour fayre, On goodly courser thondring with his feet, Eftsoones supposed him a person meet, Of his revenge to make the instrument: For since the Redcrosse knight he erst did weet, To beene with Guyon knitt in one consent,9 The ill, which earst to him, he now to Guyon ment.

1

liegeman: vassal, servant. kind: nature; unfold: reveal. 3 practick knavery: artful tricks. 2

4 His ydle humour: his (Braggadocchio’s) empty conceit. 5 man: servant. The name Trompart suggests both the French tromper, “to deceive” (Trompart is an expert in the art of trumpery, or deception), and also “trumpet” (he blows or trumpets his master’s selfconceits, as in the previous line). The name Braggadocchio derives from “brag” or “braggart,” plus occhio, related either to the

Italian suffix meaning “big” or to the Italian for “eye,” suggesting that he is impressive only to the eye. (Hamilton notes the “vaunting eye” of line 2 to support this.) Braggadocchio plays the part of the miles gloriosus, or boastful warrior, a stock figure of Roman and later comedy. 6

scorne: shame. meed: reward. 8 I.e., honor only truly flowers in those of honorable stock or nature. 7

9

consent: accord.

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12

And comming close to Trompart gan inquere Of him, what mightie warriour that mote bee, That rode in golden sell with single spere, But wanted1 sword to wreake his enmitee. “He is a great adventurer,” (said he) “That hath his sword through hard assay forgone,2 And now hath vowd, till he avenged bee, Of that despight,3 never to wearen none; That speare is him enough to doen4 a thousand grone.”

13

Th’enchaunter greatly joyed in the vaunt, And weened well ere long his will to win, And both his foen with equall foyle5 to daunt. Tho to him louting6 lowly did begin To plaine of wronges, which had committed bin By Guyon, and by that false Redcrosse knight, Which two through treason and deceiptfull gin,7 Had slayne Sir Mordant, and his Lady bright: That mote him honour win, to wreak8 so foule despight.

14

Therewith all suddeinly he seemd enragd, And threatned death with dreadfull countenaunce, As if their lives had in his hand beene gagd;9 And with stiffe10 force shaking his mortall launce, To let him weet his doughtie valiaunce,11 Thus said; “Old man, great sure shalbe thy meed, If where those knights for feare of dew vengeaunce Doe lurke, thou certeinly to mee areed, That I may wreake on them their hainous hateful deed.”

15

“Certes, my Lord,” (said he) “that shall I soone, And give you eke good helpe to their decay.12 But mote I wisely you advise to doon;13 Give no ods to your foes, but doe purvay

1

8

2

9

wanted: lacked. forgone: lost. 3 despight: insult, shame. 4 doen: make. 5 foen: foes; foyle: overthrow, defeat. 6 louting: bowing. 7 gin: trick.

43

wreak: avenge. gagd: left in control (as a pledge). 10 stiffe: strong. 11 doughtie valiaunce: courageous valor. 12 decay: destruction, death. 13 to doon: what to do.

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Your selfe of sword before that bloody day: For they be two the prowest1 knights on grownd, And oft approv’d2 in many hard assay, And eke of surest steele, that may be fownd, Doe arme your self against that day, them to confownd.”3 16

“Dotard,” (said he) “let be thy deepe advise; Seemes that through many yeares thy wits thee faile, And that weake eld hath left thee nothing wise, Else never should thy judgement be so frayle, To measure manhood by the sword or mayle.4 Is not enough fowre quarters of a man, Withouten sword or shield, an hoste to quayle?5 Thou litle wotest, what this right-hand can: Speake they, which have beheld the battailes, which it wan.”

17

The man was much abashed at his boast; Yet well he wist, that who so would contend With either of those knightes on even coast,6 Should neede of all his armes, him to defend; Yet feared least his boldnesse should offend, When Braggadocchio saide, “Once I did sweare, When with one sword seven knightes I brought to end, Thence forth in battaile never sword to beare, But7 it were that, which noblest knight on earth doth weare.”

18

“Perdy Sir knight,” said then th’enchaunter blive,8 “That shall I shortly purchase9 to your hond: For now the best and noblest knight alive, Prince Arthur is, that wonnes in Faerie lond;10 He hath a sword, that flames like burning brond. The same by my device11 I undertake

1

prowest: most valiant.

2

approv’d: proven, tested. 3 against: in preparation for; confownd: defeat. 4 mayle: mail, i.e., armor. 5 quayle: daunt. 6 coast: ground, footing. 7

But: unless.

8

Perdy: indeed (an oath, from French par Dieu, by God); blive: quickly. 9 purchase: furnish. 10 Arthur is not a native of Faerie Land, being British, but he “wonnes” (dwells) there while he travels in search of the Faerie Queen. 11

device: working.

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Shall by to morrow by thy side be fond.” At which bold word that boaster gan to quake, And wondred in his minde, what mote that Monster1 make. 19

He stayd not for more bidding,2 but away Was suddein vanished out of his sight: The Northerne winde his wings did broad display At his commaund, and reared him up light From off the earth, to take his aerie flight. They lookt about, but no where could espye Tract of his foot: then dead through great affright They both nigh were, and each bad other flye: Both fled attonce, ne ever backe returned eye.

20

Till that they come unto a forrest greene, In which they shrowd themselves from causeles feare; Yet feare them followes still, where so they beene,3 Each trembling leafe, and whistling wind they heare, As ghastly bug4 does greatly them affeare: Yet both doe strive their fearefulnesse to faine.5 At last they heard a horne, that shrilled cleare Throughout the wood, that ecchoed againe, And made the forrest ring, as it would rive6 in twaine.

21

Eft through the thicke they heard one rudely7 rush; With noyse whereof he from his loftie steed Downe fell to ground, and crept into a bush, To hide his coward head from dying dreed.8 But Trompart stoutly stayd to taken heed, Of what might hap. Eftsoone there stepped foorth A goodly Ladie clad in hunters weed,9 That seemd to be a woman of great worth, And by her stately portance,10 borne of heavenly birth.

1

6

Monster: wonder, marvel; i.e., Braggadocchio wonders how this miracle will happen. 2 bidding: instructions. 3 where so they beene: wherever they are.

rive: split. Eft: then, soon; thicke: thicket; rudely: wildly. 8 from dying dreed: out of mortal fear, from fear of death.

4

9

5

ghastly bug: frightful ghost. faine: disguise, hide.

7

weed: garment. portance: bearing.

10

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22

Her face so faire as flesh it seemed not, But hevenly pourtraict of bright Angels hew,1 Cleare as the skye, withouten blame2 or blot, Through goodly mixture of complexions dew; And in her cheekes the vermeill3 red did shew Like roses in a bed of lillies shed, The which ambrosiall4 odours from them threw, And gazers sence with double pleasure fed, Hable5 to heale the sicke, and to revive the ded.

23

In her faire eyes two living lamps did flame, Kindled above at th’hevenly makers light, And darted fyrie beames out of the same, So passing persant,6 and so wondrous bright, That quite bereav’d the rash beholders sight: In them the blinded god7 his lustfull fyre To kindle oft assayd, but had no might; For with dredd Majestie, and awfull yre,8 She broke his wanton darts,9 and quenched bace desyre.

24

Her yvorie forhead, full of bountie brave,10 Like a broad table11 did it selfe dispred, For Love his loftie triumphes to engrave, And write the battailes of his great godhed: All good and honour might therein be red: For there their dwelling was. And when she spake, Sweete wordes, like dropping12 honny she did shed, And twixt the perles and rubins13 softly brake A silver sound, that heavenly musicke seemd to make.

1

hew: appearance, complexion. blame: fault. 3 vermeill: vermilion, bright red. 4 ambrosiall: heavenly. Ambrosia was the food of the gods; cf. Virgil, Aeneid, 1.403, the description of Venus’ sudden appearance, dressed as a huntress, before Aeneas, to which Spenser’s description of Belphoebe is indebted. The whole passage beginning at stanza 22 forms an extended example of the blazon, a poetic inventory of a woman’s body. 2

5

Hable: able. persant: piercing. 7 Cupid, the god of love, is often depicted blindfolded (since love is blind). 8 awfull yre: fearful anger. 9 wanton darts: mischievous arrows. 10 bountie brave: great virtue. 11 table: tablet, writing surface. 12 dropping: dripping; cf. v.33.4 and n., and also Song Sol. 4.11: “Thy lippes, my spouse, droppe as honie combes.” 6

13

rubins: rubies, i.e., her lips.

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25

Upon her eyelids many Graces1 sate, Under the shadow of her even browes, Working belgardes, and amorous retrate,2 And everie one her with a grace endowes: And everie one with meekenesse to her bowes. So glorious mirrhour of celestiall grace, And soveraine moniment3 of mortall vowes, How shall frayle pen descrive her heavenly face, For feare through want of skill her beauty to disgrace?

26

So faire, and thousand thousand times more faire She seemd, when she presented was to sight, And was yclad, for4 heat of scorching aire, All in a silken Camus5 lylly whight, Purfled upon with many a folded plight,6 Which all above besprinckled was throughout, With golden aygulets,7 that glistred bright, Like twinckling starres, and all the skirt about Was hemd with golden fringe.8

27

Below her ham her weed did somewhat trayne,9 And her streight legs most bravely were embayld10 In gilden buskins of costly Cordwayne,11 All bard with golden bendes, which were entayld12 With curious antickes, and full fayre aumayld:13 Before14 they fastned were under her knee

1

Graces: graceful attributes; also the classical goddesses who embody those attributes. 2 The graces produce fair looks and amorous images, but “belgardes” also suggests Belphoebe’s guarding her beauty, and “retrate” can mean “retreat” as well as “picture” (Hamilton). 3 moniment: object, shrine. 4 for: because of. 5 Camus: light dress (Italian camicia, French chemise). 6 Purfled: embroidered; plight: pleat. 7 aygulets: aglets, spangles. 8 This is the first of several lines Spenser leaves incomplete. His authority is Virgil, although the half lines in the Aeneid may

47

not have been intentional, since Virgil died before his revisions were complete. Hamilton suggests that the gap here may modestly skip over what comes between the hem of Belphoebe’s chemise and her legs, which are described in the next stanza. 9 ham: thigh; trayne: hang, trail. 10 embayld: enclosed. 11 gilden buskins: gilded boots; Cordwayne: Cordovan leather. 12 bard: striped; bendes: bands; entayld: engraved. 13 curious antickes: strange figures; aumayld: enameled. 14 Before: in front.

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48

In a rich jewell, and therein entrayld1 The ends of all the knots, that none might see, How they within their fouldings close enwrapped bee. 28

Like two faire marble pillours2 they were seene, Which doe the temple of the Gods support, Whom all the people decke with girlands greene, And honour in their festivall resort;3 Those same with stately grace, and princely port She taught to tread, when she her selfe would grace, But with the woody Nymphes when she did play,4 Or when the flying Libbard5 she did chace, She could them nimbly move, and after fly apace.

29

And in her hand a sharpe bore-speare6 she held, And at her backe a bow and quiver gay, Stuft with steele-headed dartes, wherewith she queld7 The salvage beastes in her victorious play,8 Knit with a golden bauldricke,9 which forelay Athwart10 her snowy brest, and did divide Her daintie paps;11 which like young fruit in May Now little gan to swell, and being tide, Through her thin weed their places only signifide.

30

Her yellow lockes crisped,12 like golden wyre, About her shoulders weren loosely shed, And when the winde emongst them did inspyre,13 They waved like a penon14 wyde dispred And low behinde her backe were scattered: And whether art it were, or heedelesse hap,15

1

entrayld: intertwined.

2 Cf. Song Sol. 5.15: “His leggs are as pillers

of marble.” 3 resort: assembly, throng. 4 On the lack of rhyme, see ii.7.7n. 5 flying Libbard: fleeing leopard. 6 Boar-hunting figures prominently in classical mythology; the boar, like the leopard in 28.8 above, is sometimes taken to represent lust. 7

queld: killed.

8

salvage: wild; play: sport. knit: bound, attached; bauldricke: strap. 10 forelay / Athwart: lay before and across. 11 paps: breasts. 12 crisped: curled. 13 inspyre: blow. 14 penon: pennant, flag. 15 I.e., and whether deliberately or unintentionally, by chance. 9

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As through the flouring forrest rash1 she fled, In her rude heares sweet flowres themselves did lap,2 And flourishing fresh leaves and blossomes did enwrap. 31

Such as Diana by the sandy shore Of swift Eurotas, or on Cynthus greene,3 Where all the Nymphes have her unwares forlore,4 Wandreth alone with bow and arrows keene, To seeke her game: Or as that famous Queene Of Amazons, whom Pyrrhus did destroy, The day that first of Priame she was seene, Did shew her selfe in great triumphant joy, To succour the weake state of sad afflicted Troy.5

32

Such when as hartlesse6 Trompart her did vew, He was dismayed in his coward minde, And doubted, whether he himselfe should shew, Or fly away, or bide alone behinde: Both feare and hope he in her face did finde, When she at last him spying thus bespake; “Hayle Groome; didst not thou see a bleeding Hynde, Whose right haunch earst my stedfast arrow strake?7 If thou didst, tell me, that I may her overtake.”

33

Wherewith reviv’d, this answere forth he threw; “O Goddesse, (for such I thee take to bee) For nether doth thy face terrestriall shew, Nor voyce sound mortall; I avow to thee, Such wounded beast, as that, I did not see, Sith earst into this forrest wild I came. But mote thy goodlyhed forgive8 it mee, To weete, which of the Gods I shall thee name, That unto thee dew worship I may rightly frame.”

1

rash: swiftly. rude: unkempt; lap: fold, twine. 3 Eurotas is a river near Sparta in Greece; Cynthus is a mountain on the Greek island of Delos, birthplace of Diana. Spenser is closely imitating Virgil, Aeneid, 1.498–99. 4 forlore: lost, left behind. 5 The Amazons were a race of warrior women; see Proem 2.8 and n. Their queen, 2

Penthesilea, came to the aid of King Priam of Troy, but was killed in battle by Pyrrhus, son of Achilles. 6 hartlesse: frightened. 7 stedfast: steady, straight-shooting; strake: struck. 8 thy goodlyhed: your excellency; forgive: grant.

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34

To whom she thus; but ere her words ensewd, Unto the bush her eye did suddein glaunce, In which vaine Braggadocchio was mewd,1 And saw it stirre: she lefte her percing launce, And towards gan a deadly shafte advaunce, In mind to marke the beast. At which sad stowre,2 Trompart forth stept, to stay the mortall chaunce,3 Out crying, “O what ever hevenly powre, Or earthly wight thou be, withhold this deadly howre.

35

“O stay thy hand, for yonder is no game For thy fiers arrowes, them to exercize, But loe my Lord, my liege, whose warlike name, Is far renowmd through many bold emprize;4 And now in shade he shrowded yonder lies.” She staid: with that he crauld out of his nest, Forth creeping on his caitive hands and thies, And standing stoutly up, his lofty crest Did fiercely shake, and rowze,5 as comming late from rest.

36

As fearfull fowle, that long in secret cave For dread of soring hauke her selfe hath hid, Not caring how her silly6 life to save, She her gay painted plumes disorderid, Seeing at last her selfe from daunger rid, Peepes forth, and soone renews her native pride;7 She gins her feathers fowle disfigured Prowdly to prune, and sett8 on every side, So shakes off shame, ne thinks how erst she did her hide.

37

So when her goodly visage he beheld, He gan himelfe to vaunt: but when he vewd Those deadly tooles, which in her hand she held, Soone into other fitts he was transmewd,9 Till she to him her gracious speech renewd;

1

5

2

6

mewd: enclosed. marke: aim at, shoot; sad stowre: distressful moment. 3

stay the mortall chaunce: stop the deadly event. 4 emprize: adventure, undertaking.

rowze: rise, awake, ruffle up. silly: helpless. 7 pride: pomp, display. 8 prune, and sett: preen and arrange. 9 other fitts: new fits (of trembling); transmewd: altered, transported.

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“All haile, Sir knight, and well may thee befall, As all the like, which honor have persewd Through deeds of armes and prowesse martiall; All vertue merits praise, but such the most of all.” 38

To whom he thus, “O fairest under skie,1 Trew be thy words, and worthy of thy praise,2 That warlike feats doest highest glorifie. Therein I have spent all my youthly daies, And many battailes fought, and many fraies3 Throughout the world, wherso they might be found, Endevoring my dreaded name to raise Above the Moone,4 that fame may it resound In her eternall tromp, with laurell girlond5 cround.

39

“But what art thou, O Lady, which doest raunge In this wilde forest, where no pleasure is, And doest not it for joyous court exchaunge, Emongst thine equall peres, where happy blis And all delight does raigne, much more then this? There thou maist love, and dearly loved be, And swim in pleasure, which thou here doest mis;6 There maist thou best be seene, and best maist see: The wood is fit for beasts, the court is fitt for thee.”

40

“Who so in pompe of prowd estate”7 (quoth she) “Does swim, and bathes him selfe in courtly blis, Does waste his dayes in darke obscuritee, And in oblivion ever buried is: Where ease abownds, yt’s eath8 to doe amis; But who his limbs with labours, and his mynd Behaves with cares, cannot so easy mis.9 Abroad in armes, at home in studious kynd10 Who seekes with painfull toile, shall honor soonest fynd.

1

Spenser uses this same phrase in addressing Queen Elizabeth at Proem 4.6. 2 I.e., you are worthy of your own praise. 3 fraies: combats. 4 Whatever is below the moon (“sublunary”) is subject to change; everything above it is eternal.

5

tromp: trumpet; laurell girlond: a garland of laurel is the sign of victory. 6 mis: lack. 7 estate: station, position. 8 eath: easy. 9 behaves with cares: manages with study or effort; mis: go wrong. 10 kynd: manner.

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52 41

“In woods, in waves, in warres she1 wonts to dwell, And wilbe found with perill and with paine; Ne can the man, that moulds2 in ydle cell, Unto her happy mansion3 attaine: Before her gate high God did Sweate ordaine, And wakefull watches4 ever to abide: But easy is the way, and passage plaine5 To pleasures pallace; it may soone be spide, And day and night her dores to all stand open wide.

42

In Princes court—” The rest she would have sayd, But that the foolish man, fild with delight Of her sweete words, that all his sence dismayd,6 And with her wondrous beauty ravisht quight, Gan burne in filthy lust, and leaping light, Thought in his bastard7 armes her to embrace. With that she swarving backe, her Javelin bright Against him bent,8 and fiercely did menace: So turned her about, and fled away apace.

43

Which when the Pesaunt9 saw, amazd he stood, And grieved at her flight; yet durst he nott Pursew her steps, through wild unknowen wood; Besides he feard her wrath, and threatned shott Whiles in the bush he lay, not yet forgott: Ne car’d he greatly for her presence vayne,10 But turning said to Trompart, “What fowle blott Is this to knight, that Lady should agayne Depart to woods untoucht, and leave so proud disdayne?”

44

“Perdy” (said Trompart) “lett her pas at will,11 Least by her presence daunger mote befall. For who can tell (and sure I feare it ill) But that shee is some powre celestiall? For whiles she spake, her great words did apall

1

7

2

8

I.e., honor. moulds: languishes. 3 mansion: dwelling place. 4 watches: vigils. 5 Cf. Matt. 7.13. 6 dismayd: overcame.

bastard: illegitimate (since he is a fake). bent: aimed. 9 Pesaunt: wretch, lowly person. 10 vayne: useless (to him). 11 pas at will: go as she wishes.

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My feeble corage, and my heart oppresse, That yet I quake and tremble over all.” “And I” (said Braggadocchio) “thought no lesse, When first I heard her horn sound with such ghastlinesse.1 45

“For from my mothers wombe this grace I have Me given by eternall destiny, That earthly thing may not my corage brave Dismay with feare, or cause on foote to flye, But either hellish feends, or powres on hye: Which was the cause, when earst that horne I heard, Weening it had beene thunder in the skye, I hid my selfe from it, as one affeard; But when I other2 knew, my selfe I boldly reard.

46

“But now for feare of worse, that may betide, Let us soone hence depart.” They soone agree; So to his steed he gott, and gan to ride, As one unfitt therefore, that all might see He had not trayned bene in chevalree.3 Which well that valiaunt courser did discerne; For he despisd to tread in dew degree,4 But chaufd5 and fom’d, with corage fiers and sterne, And to be easd of that base burden still did erne.6

1

4

2

5

ghastlinesse: frightfulness, unearthliness. other: otherwise. 3 chevalree: knighthood, horsemanship.

I.e., for he refused to walk with proper gait. chaufd: chafed. 6 erne: yearn.

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Canto Four Guyon does Furor bind in chaines, And stops Occasion: Delivers 1 Phaon, and therefore By strife is rayld uppon.

1

In brave poursuitt of honorable deed, There is, I know not what great difference Betweene the vulgar and the noble seed,2 Which unto things of valorous pretence3 Seemes to be borne by native influence;4 As feates of armes, and love to entertaine,5 But chiefly skill to ride seemes a science6 Proper to gentle blood; some others faine To menage steeds, as did this vaunter;7 but in vaine.

2

But he the rightfull owner of that steede, Who well could menage and subdew his pride, The whiles on foot was forced for to yeed,8 With that blacke Palmer, his most trusty guide; Who suffred not his wandring feete to slide. But when strong passion or weake fleshlinesse, Would from the right way seeke to draw him wide, He would through temperaunce and stedfastnesse, Teach him the weak to strengthen, and the strong suppresse.

3

It fortuned forth faring on his way, He saw from far, or seemed for to see9 Some troublous uprore or contentious fray,

1

6

2

7

Delivers: frees, rescues. vulgar: common; seed: stock. 3 of valorous pretence: with a claim to valor. 4 I.e., by reason of nature or birth, rather than by training or effort. 5 love to entertaine: to engage in (courtly) love.

science: craft, ability. I.e., Braggadocchio. 8 yeed: go. 9 Cf. Virgil, Aeneid, 6.454; here the qualification may be due to the allegorical nature of the figures Guyon seems to see (Hamilton).

54

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Whereto he drew in hast it to agree.1 A mad man, or that feigned mad to bee, Drew by the heare along upon the grownd, A handsom stripling2 with great crueltee, Whom sore he bett, and gor’d with many a wownd, That cheekes with teares, and sydes with blood did all abownd. 4

And him behynd, a wicked Hag did stalke,3 In ragged robes, and filthy disaray, Her other leg4 was lame, that she no’te walke. But on her staffe her feeble steps did stay;5 Her lockes, that loathly were and hoarie gray, Grew all afore, and loosly hong unrold, But all behind was bald, and worne away, That none thereof could ever taken hold, And eke her face ill favourd,6 full of wrinckles old.

5

And ever as she went, her toung did walke7 In fowle reproach, and termes of vile despight, Provoking him by her outrageous talke, To heape more vengeance on that wretched wight; Somtimes she raught8 him stones, wherwith to smite, Sometimes her staffe, though it her one leg were, Withouten which she could not goe upright; Ne any evill meanes she did forbeare, That might him move to wrath, and indignation reare.9

6

The noble Guyon mov’d with great remorse,10 Approching, first the Hag did thrust away, And after adding more impetuous forse, His mighty hands did on the madman lay, And pluckt11 him backe; who all on fire streight way,

1

agree: settle, pacify. stripling: youth. 3 stalke: limp, pursue (like prey). 4 I.e., one of her legs; cf. Impotence at xi.23. 5 stay: support. 6 ill favourd: ugly. According to proverbial wisdom, one must “Take Occasion by the forelock”––because once opportunity has passed, there is no way to grab hold and 2

bring it back. Hence Occasion (she is named in the Arg., line 2) is often depicted, as here, with hair in front covering her face, but bald behind. 7 walke: run, go on. 8

raught: reached, fetched. reare: rouse. 10 remorse: pity. 11 pluckt: pulled. 9

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Against him turning all his fell intent,1 With beastly brutish rage gan him assay, And smott, and bitt, and kickt, and scratcht, and rent, And did he wist not what in his avengement.2 7

And sure he was a man of mickle3 might, Had he had governaunce,4 it well to guyde: But when the frantick fitt inflamd his spright, His force was vaine and strooke more often wyde, Then at the aymed marke, which he had eyde: And oft himselfe he chaunst to hurt unwares, Whilst reason blent5 through passion, nought descryde But as a blindfold Bull at randon fares,6 And where he hits, nought knowes, and whom he hurts, nought cares.

8

His rude assault and rugged7 handeling Straunge seemed to the knight, that aye with foe In fayre defence and goodly menaging Of armes was wont to fight, yet nathemoe8 Was he abashed9 now not fighting so, But more enfierced through his currish play,10 Him sternly grypt, and hailing11 to and fro, To overthrow him strongly did assay, But overthrew him selfe unwares, and lower lay.

9

And being downe the villein sore did beate, And bruze with clownish12 fistes his manly face: And eke the Hag with many a bitter threat, Still cald upon to kill him in the place.13 With whose reproch14 and odious menace The knight emboyling15 in his haughtie hart,

1

intent: attention, effort. avengement: retaliation. 3 mickle: great. 4 governaunce: self-control. 5 blent: blinded. 6 at randon fares: goes wild. 7 rude: wild; rugged: rough. 8 nathemoe: not the more. 9 abashed: confounded. 2

10

enfierced through his currish play: enraged by his beastly style of fighting. 11 hailing: dragging. 12 clownish: lowly, rustic; the same implication of low class pertains to “villein” in the previous line. 13 in the place: on the spot. 14 reproch: insult. 15 emboyling: seething with anger.

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57

Knit all his forces, and gan soone unbrace1 His grasping hold: so lightly did upstart, And drew his deadly weapon, to maintaine his part.2 10

Which when the Palmer saw, he loudly cryde, “Not so O Guyon, never thinke that so That Monster can be maistred or destroyd: He is not, ah, he is not such a foe, As steele can wound, or strength can overthroe. That same is Furor,3 cursed cruel wight, That unto knighthood workes much shame and woe; And that same Hag, his aged mother, hight Occasion, the roote of all wrath and despight.

11

“With her, who so will raging Furor tame, Must first begin, and well her amenage:4 First her restraine from her reprochfull blame,5 And evill meanes, with which she doth enrage Her frantick sonne, and kindles his corage,6 Then when she is withdrawne,7 or strong withstood, It’s eath8 his ydle fury to aswage, And calme the tempest of his passion wood;9 The bankes are overflowne, when stopped is the flood.”10

12

Therewith Sir Guyon left his first emprise, And turning to that woman, fast her hent By the hoare lockes, that hong before her eyes, And to the ground her threw; yet n’ould she stent11 Her bitter rayling and foule revilement, But still provokt her sonne to wreake her wrong; But nathelesse he did her still torment, And catching hold of her ungratious tonge, Thereon an yron lock, did fasten firme and strong.

1

unbrace: unclasp. maintaine his part: defend himself. 3 Furor: Latin for “rage.” 4 amenage: control. 5 reprochfull blame: shameful insults. 6 corage: energy. 7 withdrawne: put aside. 2

8

eath: easy. wood: mad. 10 flood: flow (of a river). Fighting against Furor only causes greater destruction, just as damming a river only causes it to overflow its banks. 9

11

n’ould she stent: she would not stop.

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13

Then whenas use of speech was from her reft, With her two crooked handes she signes did make, And beckned him, the last help she had left: But he that last left helpe away did take, And both her handes fast bound unto a stake, That she note stirre. Then gan her sonne to flye Full fast away, and did her quite forsake; But Guyon after him in hast did hye, And soone him overtooke in sad perplexitye.1

14

In his strong armes he stifly him embraste, Who him gainstriving,2 nought at all prevaild: For all his power was utterly defaste,3 And furious fitts at earst quite weren quaild:4 Oft he re’nforst,5 and oft his forces fayld, Yet yield he would not, nor his rancor slack. Then him to ground he cast, and rudely hayld,6 And both his hands fast bound behind his backe, And both his feet in fetters to an yron rack.

15

With hundred yron chaines he did him bind, And hundred knots that did him sore constraine:7 Yet his great yron teeth he still did grind, And grimly gnash, threatning revenge in vaine: His burning eyen, whom bloody strakes8 did staine, Stared full wide, and threw forth sparkes of fyre, And more for ranck despight,9 then for great paine, Shakt his long locks, colourd like copper-wyre, And bitt his tawny10 beard to shew his raging yre.

16

Thus whenas Guyon Furor had captivd, Turning about he saw that wretched Squyre, Whom that mad man of life nigh11 late deprivd,

1

perplexitye: confusion, distress. gainstriving: striving against. 3 defaste: defeated. 4 at earst: at once; quaild: quelled. 5 re’nforst: strove again. 6 hayld: hauled, dragged. 7 Furor is similarly bound in Virgil, Aeneid, 1.294–96. 2

8

eyen: eyes; strakes: streaks. ranck despight: sheer anger. 10 tawny: i.e., red, like his hair in the previous line. Red hair is traditionally a sign of a passionate or angry nature. 9

11

nigh: nearly.

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Canto Four

Lying on ground, all soild with blood and myre: Whom whenas he perceived to respyre,1 He gan to comfort, and his woundes to dresse. Being at last recured, he gan inquyre, What hard mishap him brought to such distresse, And made that caytives thrall, the thrall of wretchednesse. 17

With hart then throbbing, and with watry eyes, “Fayre Sir” (quoth he) “what man can shun the hap, That hidden lyes unwares him to surpryse? Misfortune waites advantage2 to entrap The man most wary in her whelming lap.3 So me weake wretch, of many weakest wretch, Unweeting, and unware of such mishap, She brought to mischiefe through her guilful trech,4 Where this same wicked villein did me wandring ketch.

18

“It was a faithlesse Squire, that was the sourse Of all my sorrow, and of these sad teares, With whom from tender dug of commune5 nourse, Attonce6 I was upbrought, and eft when yeares More rype us reason lent to chose our Peares,7 Our selves in league of vowed love wee knitt: In which we long time without gealous feares, Or faultie thoughts contynewd, as was fitt; And for my part I vow, dissembled not a whitt.

19

“It was my fortune, commune to that age, To love a Lady fayre of great degree,8 The which was borne of noble parentage, And set in highest seat of dignitee, Yet seemd no lesse to love, then loved to bee: Long I her serv’d, and found her faithfull still, Ne ever thing could cause us disagree: Love that two harts makes one, makes eke one will: Each strove to please, and others pleasure to fulfill.

1

respyre: breathe. advantage: opportunity. 3 lap: embrace, fold of a skirt.

5

2

6

4

8

mischiefe: trouble, misfortune; trech: treachery.

dug: breast; commune: shared. Attonce: together. 7 Peares: peers, companions. degree: status.

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20

“My friend, hight Philemon, I did partake,1 Of all my love and all my privitie;2 Who greatly joyous seemed for my sake, And gratious to that Lady, as to mee, Ne ever wight, that mote so welcome bee, As he to her, withouten blott3 or blame, Ne ever thing, that she could thinke or see, But unto him she would impart the same: O wretched man, that would abuse so gentle Dame.

21

“At last such grace I found, and meanes I wrought, That I that Lady to my spouse had wonne; Accord of friendes, consent of Parents sought, Affyaunce4 made, my happinesse begonne, That wanted5 nought but few rites to be donne, Which mariage make; that day too farre did seeme: Most joyous man, on whom the shining Sunne, Did shew his face, my selfe I did esteeme, And that my falser6 friend did no lesse joyous deeme.

22

“But ere that wished day his beame disclosd, He either envying my toward7 good, Or of himselfe to treason ill disposd One day unto me came in friendly mood, And told for secret how he understood That Lady whom I had to me assynd,8 Had both distaind9 her honorable blood, And eke the faith, which she to me did bynd;10 And therfore wisht me stay, till I more truth should fynd.

23

“The gnawing anguish and sharp gelosy, Which his sad11 speach infixed in my brest, Ranckled so sore, and festred inwardly,

1

partake: confide to. “Philemon” is a traditional name in romance, deriving from the Greek for “love” or “friendship.” This story, though with different names, is also traditional: it occurs in Ariosto, Orlando Furioso (Canto 4), and Shakespeare, Much Ado about Nothing. 2 privitie: secrets, private affairs. 3 blott: fault.

4

Affyaunce: betrothal. wanted: there lacked. 6 falser: very false. 7 toward: forthcoming. 8 assynd: ordained, chosen. 9 distaind: stained, dishonored. 10 bynd: swear. 11 sad: grievous. 5

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61

That my engreeved mind could find no rest, Till that the truth thereof I did out wrest, And him besought by that same sacred band1 Betwixt us both, to counsell me the best. He then with solemne oath and plighted hand2 Assurd, ere long the truth to let3 me understand. 24

“Ere long with like againe he boorded mee, Saying, he now had boulted4 all the floure, And that it was a groome5 of base degree, Which of my love was partener Paramoure: Who used in a darkesome inner bowre Her oft to meete: which better to approve,6 He promised to bring me at that howre, When I should see, that would me nearer move,7 And drive me to withdraw my blind abused8 love.

25

“This gracelesse man for furtherance of his guile, Did court the handmayd of my Lady deare, Who glad t’embosome9 his affection vile, Did all she might, more pleasing to appeare. One day to worke her to his will more neare, He woo’d her thus: ‘Pryene’ (so she hight) ‘What great despight doth fortune to thee beare, Thus lowly to abase thy beautie bright, That it should not deface10 all others lesser light?

26

“‘But if she had her least helpe to thee lent, T’adorne thy forme according thy desart, Their blazing pride thou wouldest soone have blent,11 And staynd their prayses with thy least good part;12 Ne should faire Claribell 13 with all her art,

1

band: bond. plighted hand: pledging handshake. 3 let: help, make; but ominously the word can also mean “prevent.” 4 boulted: sifted. 5 groome: man, servant. 6 approve: prove. 7 that would me nearer move: what would affect me more directly or deeply. 2

8

abused: injured, deceived. t’embosome: to receive. 10 deface: dim (by outshining). 11 blent: blinded, outshone. 12 I.e., even your least feature would have eclipsed all their praise. 13 Claribell means “bright beauty,” which is in keeping with the imagery of these two stanzas. 9

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Though she thy Lady be, approch thee neare:1 For proofe thereof, this evening, as thou art, Aray thy selfe in her most gorgeous geare,2 That I may more delight in thy embracement deare.’ 27

“The Mayden proud through praise, and mad through love Him hearkned to, and soone her selfe arayd, The whiles to me the treachour did remove3 His craftie engin, and as he had sayd, Me leading, in a secret corner layd, The sad spectatour of my Tragedie; Where left, he went, and his owne false part playd, Disguised like that groome of base degree, Whom he had feignd th’abuser of my love to bee.

28

“Eftsoones he came unto th’appointed place, And with him brought Pryene, rich arayd, In Claribellaes clothes. Her proper4 face I not descerned in that darkesome shade, But weend it was my love, with whom he playd. Ah God, what horrour and tormenting griefe My hart, my handes, mine eyes, and all assayd: Me liefer were ten thousand deathes priefe,5 Then wounde of gealous worme, and shame of such repriefe.6

29

“I home retourning, fraught with fowle despight, And chawing7 vengeaunce all the way I went, Soone as my loathed love appeard in sight, With wrathfull hand I slew her innocent; That after soone I dearely did lament: For when the cause of that outrageous deede Demaunded, I made plaine and evident, Her faultie Handmayd, which that bale8 did breede, Confest, how Philemon her wrought9 to chaunge her weede.

1

approch thee neare: come close to comparing with you. 2 geare: attire. 3 treachour: traitor, deceiver; remove: transfer. 4 proper: true, own.

5

Me liefer were: I would prefer; priefe: trial, experience. 6 worme: serpent; repriefe: reproof, i.e., disgrace. 7 chawing: gnawing, ruminating. 8 bale: evil, misery. 9 wrought: made, convinced.

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“Which when I heard, with horrible affright And hellish fury all enragd, I sought Upon my selfe that vengeable despight1 To punish: yet it better first I thought, To wreake my wrath on him, that first it wrought. To Philemon, false faytour2 Philemon I cast to pay, that I so dearely bought;3 Of deadly drugs I gave him drinke anon, And washt away his guilt with guilty potion.

31

“Thus heaping crime on crime, and griefe on griefe, To losse of love adjoyning losse of frend, I meant to purge both with a third mischiefe,4 And in my woes beginner it to end: That was Pryene; she did first offend, She last should smart: with which cruell intent, When I at her my murdrous blade did bend, She fled away with ghastly dreriment,5 And I poursewing my fell purpose, after went.

32

“Feare gave her winges, and rage enforst6 my flight; Through woods and plaines so long I did her chace, Till this mad man, whom your victorious might Hath now fast bound, me met in middle space,7 As I her, so he me poursewd apace, And shortly overtooke: I breathing yre, Sore chauffed at my stay8 in such a cace, And with my heat kindled his cruell fyre; Which kindled once, his mother did more rage inspyre.

33

“Betwixt them both, they have me doen to dye,9 Through wounds, and strokes, and stubborne10 handeling, That death were better, then such agony,

1

vengeable despight: terrible or punishable outrage. 2 faytour: impostor. 3 I.e., I sought to pay back for what had cost me so much (pain). 4 mischiefe: crime. 5 ghastly dreriment: dreadful sorrow or fear.

63

6

enforst: strengthened. This is explained in the following line: Phaon is now both pursuing and pursued. 7 8

Sore chauffed at my stay: chafed angrily at my being detained. 9 doen to dye: pushed to the brink of death. 10 stubborne: rough.

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As griefe and fury unto me did bring; Of which in me yet stickes the mortall sting, That during life will never be appeasd.” When he thus ended had his sorrowing, Said Guyon, “Squyre, sore have ye beene diseasd; But all your hurts may soone through temperance be easd.” 34

Then gan the Palmer thus, “Most wretched man, That to affections does the bridle lend;1 In their beginning they are weake and wan, But soone through suff’rance2 growe to fearefull end; Whiles they are weake betimes3 with them contend: For when they once to perfect4 strength do grow, Strong warres they make, and cruell battry5 bend Gainst fort of Reason, it to overthrow: Wrath, gelosy, griefe, love this Squyre have laide thus low.

35

“Wrath, gealosie, griefe, love do thus expell: Wrath is a fire, and gealosie a weede, Griefe is a flood, and love a monster fell; The fire of sparkes, the weede of little seede, The flood of drops, the Monster filth did breede: But sparks, seed, drops, and filth do thus delay;6 The sparks soone quench, the springing seed outweed The drops dry up, and filth wipe cleane away: So shall wrath, gealosy, grief, love die and decay.”

36

“Unlucky Squire” (saide Guyon) “sith thou hast Falne into mischiefe through intemperaunce, Henceforth take heede of that thou now hast past, And guyde thy waies with warie governaunce,7 Least worse betide thee by some later chaunce. But read how art thou nam’d, and of what kin.” “Phaon I hight” (quoth he) “and do advaunce Mine auncestry from famous Coradin,8 Who first to rayse our house to honour did begin.”

1 affections: passions; bridle lend: give over the reins. 2 suff ’rance: allowance, indulgence. 3 betimes: before it is too late. 4 perfect: full. 5 battry: battery, siege.

6

do thus delay: like “do thus expell” in line 1 and like the verbs in the next two lines, an imperative: “stop them thus.” 7 warie governaunce: careful control. 8 Phaon was the youth beloved of the Greek poetess Sappho, who according to legend

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Thus as he spake, lo far away they spyde A varlet1 ronning towardes hastily, Whose flying feet so fast their way applyde, That round about a cloud of dust did fly, Which mingled all with sweate, did dim his eye. He soone approched, panting, breathlesse, whot, And all so soyld, that none could him descry; His countenaunce was bold, and bashed2 not For Guyons lookes, but scornefull eyglaunce at him shot.

38

Behind his backe he bore a brasen shield, On which was drawen faire, in colours fit, A flaming fire in midst of bloody field,3 And round about the wreath4 this word was writ, Burnt I doe burne. Right well beseemed it, To be the shield of some redoubted5 knight; And in his hand two dartes exceeding flit,6 And deadly sharp he held, whose heads were dight7 In poyson and in blood, of malice and despight.

39

When he in presence came, to Guyon first He boldly spake, “Sir knight, if knight thou bee, Abandon this forestalled place at erst,8 For feare of further harme, I counsell thee, Or bide the chaunce at thine owne jeopardee.” The knight at his great boldnesse wondered, And though he scornd his ydle vanitee, Yet mildly him to purpose9 answered; For not to grow of nought he it conjectured.

killed herself for his sake. In later editions, the name is changed to Phedon, a youth whom Socrates is said to have rescued from a life of debauchery. Coradin derives from Latin cor, “heart” (plus perhaps “Atin,” on which see below, 42.5n.). 1 varlet: knight’s attendant, knave. 2 bashed: lowered. 3 bloody field: red background, or possibly a depiction of a battlefield.

4

65

wreath: band for an inscription. redoubted: distinguished, dreaded. 6 flit: swift. 7 dight: dipped. 8 forestalled: bespoken, already occupied; at erst: at once. 9 to purpose: on the subject, pointedly. 5

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40

“Varlet, this place most dew to me I deeme, Yielded by him, that held it forcibly. But whence shold come that harme, which thou dost seeme To threat to him, that mindes his chaunce t’abye?”1 “Perdy” (sayd he) “here comes, and is hard by A knight of wondrous powre, and great assay, That never yet encountred enemy, But did him deadly daunt, or fowle dismay; Ne thou for better hope, if thou his presence stay.”

41

“How hight he then” (sayd Guyon) “and from whence?” “Pyrochles 2 is his name, renowmed farre For his bold feates and hardy confidence, Full oft approvd3 in many a cruell warre, The brother of Cymochles,4 both which arre The sonnes of old Acrates 5 and Despight, Acrates sonne of Phlegeton and Jarre;6 But Phlegeton is sonne of Herebus7 and Night; But Herebus sonne of Aeternitie is hight.

42

“So from immortall race he does proceede, That mortall hands may not withstand his might, Drad for his derring doe,8 and bloody deed; For all in blood and spoile is his delight. His am I Atin,9 his in wrong and right, That matter make for him to worke upon, And stirre him up to strife and cruell fight. Fly therefore, fly this fearfull stead anon, Least thy foolhardize worke thy sad confusion.”10

1 that mindes his chaunce t’abye: who intends to stay and take his chances. 2 Pyrochles: fiery, from Greek pur, “fire,” plus ochlos, “disturbance,” or possibly kleos, “fame” (he is “renowmed farre”). 3 approvd: proven, tested. 4 Cymochles: unstable, from Greek kuma, “wave.” 5 Acrates: Greek “without control,” etymologically related to Acrasia; see i.51.2n. 6 Phlegeton: in Greek mythology, the fiery river of the underworld; Jarre: jar, discord.

7

Herebus: more commonly Erebus, a name either for primeval darkness or for the underworld. This line has twelve syllables, which usually occurs only in the final line of the stanza (see Introduction, Section 2).

8

derring doe: acts of daring. Atin: called “strife” in Argument, line 4. His name seems to be a masculine form of Ate, the classical goddess of discord, on whom see vii.55.4–9 and n. 10 worke thy sad confusion: cause your unfortunate overthrow. 9

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43

“His be that care, whom most it doth concerne,” (Sayd he) “but whether1 with such hasty flight Art thou now bownd? for well mote I discerne Great cause, that carries thee so swift and light.” “My Lord” (quoth he) “me sent, and streight behight2 To seeke Occasion; where so she bee: For he is all disposd to bloody fight, And breathes out wrath and hainous crueltee; Hard is his hap,3 that first fals in his jeopardee.”

44

“Mad man” (said then the Palmer) “that does seeke Occasion to wrath, and cause of strife; Shee comes unsought, and shonned followes eke.4 Happy, who can abstaine, when Rancor rife Kindles Revenge, and threats his rusty knife; Woe never wants, where every cause is caught,5 And rash Occasion makes unquiet life.” “Then loe, wher bound she sits, whom thou hast sought,” Said Guyon, “let that message to thy Lord be brought.”

45

That when the varlett heard and saw, streight way He wexed wondrous wroth, and said, “Vile knight, That knights and knighthood doest with shame upbray,6 And shewst th’ensample of thy childishe might, With silly weake old woman that did fight. Great glory and gay spoile sure hast thou gott, And stoutly prov’d thy puissaunce here in sight; That shall Pyrrhochles well requite, I wott,7 And with thy blood abolish so reprochfull blott.”

46

With that one of his thrillant8 darts he threw, Headed with yre and vengeable9 despight; The quivering steele his aymed end wel knew, And to his brest it selfe intended right:

1 2 3

whether: whither. streight behight: ordered immediately.

hap: lot, chance. shonned followes eke: follows even when avoided. 4

5

caught: taken up. upbray: disgrace. 7 wott: know, suppose. 8 thrillant: piercing. 9 vengeable: terrible; cf. 30.3. 6

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68

But he was wary, and ere it empight1 In the meant marke, advaunst his shield atweene, On which it seizing, no way enter might, But backe rebownding, left the forckhead2 keene; Eftsoones he fled away, and might no where be seene.

1

empight: infixed.

2

forckhead: pointed arrowhead.

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Canto Five Pyrrhochles does with Guyon fight, And Furors chayne untyes, Who him sore wounds, whiles Atin to Cymochles for ayd flyes.

1

Who ever doth to temperaunce apply His stedfast life, and all his actions frame,1 Trust me, shal find no greater enimy, Then stubborne perturbation, to the same;2 To which right wel the wise doe give that name, For it the goodly peace of staied3 mindes Does overthrow, and troublous warre proclame: His owne woes author, who so bound it findes, As did Pirrhocles, and it wilfully unbindes.

2

After that varlets flight, it was not long, Ere on the plaine fast pricking Guyon spide One in bright armes embatteiled4 full strong, That as the Sunny beames doe glaunce and glide Upon the trembling wave, so shined bright, And round about him threw forth sparkling fire, That seemd him to enflame on every side: His steed was bloody red, and fomed yre, When with the maistring spur he did him roughly stire.5

3

Approching nigh, he never staid to greete, Ne chaffar6 words, prowd corage to provoke, But prickt so fiers, that underneath his feete The smouldring7 dust did rownd about him smoke,

1

4

2

5

frame: adjust, order. I.e., no greater enemy to it (temperance) than constant upheaval. Spenser takes the term “perturbation” from Cicero, one of “the wise” mentioned in the following line. 3 staied: steady.

embatteiled: equipped, armed. stire: prick, urge. 6 chaffar: exchange. 7 smouldring: burning, smothering.

69

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Both horse and man nigh able for to choke; And fayrly couching1 his steeleheaded speare, Him first saluted2 with a sturdy stroke: It booted nought Sir Guyon comming neare To thincke, such hideous puissaunce on foot to beare. 4

But lightly3 shunned it, and passing by, With his bright blade did smite at him so fell, That the sharpe steele arriving forcibly On his broad shield, bitt not, but glauncing fell On his horse necke before the quilted sell,4 And from the head the body sundred quight. So him dismounted low, he did compell On foot with him to matchen5 equall fight; The truncked beast fast bleeding, did him fowly dight.6

5

Sore bruzed with the fall, he slow uprose, And all enraged, thus him loudly shent; “Disleall7 knight, whose coward corage chose To wreake it selfe on beast all innocent, And shund the marke, at which it should be ment, Therby thine armes seem strong, but manhood frayl: So hast thou oft with guile thine honor blent;8 But litle may such guile thee now avayl, If wonted force and fortune doe me not much fayl.”

6

With that he drew his flaming sword, and strooke At him so fiercely, that the upper marge9 Of his sevenfolded10 shield away it tooke, And glauncing on his helmet, made a large

1 fayrly couching: neatly lowering into position. The term “fayrly” is ironic here, since it is unfair for a mounted knight to attack one on foot. 2 saluted: greeted. Also ironic, since Pyrochles notably skips all greeting (line 1), even though a knight is required to offer a challenge before beginning a duel. 3 lightly: deftly. 4 The saddle (“sell”) sits on a layer of quilted padding.

5

matchen: engage in. truncked: beheaded; dight: stain. 7 Disleall: unloyal, dishonorable. It was against the knightly code to attack a horse; see Introduction, Section 3. 6

8

blent: blended, besmirched. marge: rim. 10 sevenfolded: having seven layers; see iii.1.9. 9

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And open gash therein: were not his targe,1 That broke the violence of his intent, The weary sowle from thence it would discharge, Nathelesse so sore a buff to him it lent,2 That made him reele, and to his brest his bever3 bent. 7

Exceeding wroth was Guyon at that blow, And much ashamd, that stroke of living arme Should him dismay, and make him stoup so low, Though otherwise it did him litle harme: Tho hurling high his yron braced4 arme, He smote so manly on his shoulder plate, That all his left side it did quite disarme; Yet there the steele stayd not, but inly bate5 Deepe in his flesh, and opened wide a red floodgate.

8

Deadly dismayd, with horror of that dint6 Pyrrhochles was, and grieved eke entyre;7 Yet nathemore did it his fury stint, But added flame unto his former fire, That welnigh molt8 his hart in raging yre; Ne thenceforth his approved skill, to ward, Or strike, or hurtle rownd in warlike gyre,9 Remembred he, ne car’d for his saufgard,10 But rudely rag’d, and like a cruel tygre far’d.

9

He hewd, and lasht, and foynd,11 and thondred blowes, And every way did seeke into his life, Ne plate, ne male could ward so mighty throwes,12 But yielded passage to his cruell knife.13 But Guyon, in the heat of all his strife,

1 were not his targe: were it not for his shield. 2 buff: buffet, blow; lent: gave. 3 bever: mask, faceguard. 4 Tho: then; braced: girt, mailed (used specifically of armor for the arm).

8

5

12

bate: bit, cut. horror of that dint: pain of that blow. 7 entyre: utterly. 6

molt: melted. hurtle: wheel; gyre: circle. 10 saufgard: position of defensive readiness (en garde). 11 hewd, and lasht, and foynd: cut, and slashed, and lunged. 9

plate, male: types of armor; throwes: blows. 13 knife: blade, sword.

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Was wary wise, and closely1 did awayt Avauntage, whilest his foe did rage most rife; Sometimes a thwart, sometimes he strook him strayt, And falsed oft his blowes, t’illude2 him with such bayt. 10

Like as a Lyon, whose imperiall powre A prowd rebellious Unicorne defyes,3 T’avoide the rash assault and wrathfull stowre Of his fiers foe, him to a tree applyes,4 And when him ronning in full course he spyes, He slips aside; the whiles that furious beast His precious horne, sought of his enimies Strikes in the stocke,5 ne thence can be releast, But to the mighty victor yields a bounteous feast.

11

With such faire sleight him Guyon often fayld,6 Till at the last all breathlesse, weary, faint Him spying, with fresh onsett he assayld, And kindling new his corage seeming queint,7 Strooke him so hugely, that through great constraint He made him stoup perforce unto his knee, And doe unwilling worship to the Saint, That on his shield depainted he did see;8 Such homage till that instant never learned hee.

12

Whom Guyon seeing stoup, poursewed fast The present offer9 of faire victory, And soone his dreadfull blade about he cast,10 Wherewith he smote his haughty crest so hye, That streight on grownd made him full low to lye; Then on his brest his victor foote he thrust,

1

closely: defensively, secretly. falsed: feigned, foiled; t’illude: to trick. 3 According to tradition, the lion and the unicorn were natural enemies; the lion’s trick, described here, is also traditional (cf. Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, 2.1.204: “unicorns may be betray’d with trees”). Supposed horns of unicorns were still precious and sought after (line 7) in the sixteenth century. 2

4 him to . . . applyes: positions himself against. 5 stocke: trunk. 6 faire sleight: good skill, permissible deception; fayld: foiled. 7 queint: quenched. 8 Gloriana is painted on Guyon’s shield; see i.28.7 and n. 9

offer: chance, opportunity. cast: swung.

10

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73

With that he cryde, “Mercy, doe me not dye, Ne deeme thy force by fortunes doome unjust, That hath (maugre her spight) thus low me laid in dust.”1 13

Eftsoones his cruel hand Sir Guyon stayd, Tempring the passion with advizement2 slow, And maistring might3 on enimy dismayd: For th’equall die4 of warre he well did know; Then to him said, “Live and alleagaunce owe, To him, that gives thee life and liberty, And henceforth by this daies ensample trow,5 That hasty wroth, and heedlesse hazardry Doe breede repentaunce late, and lasting infamy.”

14

So up he let him rise, who with grim looke And count’naunce sterne upstanding, gan to grind His grated6 teeth for great disdeigne, and shooke His sandy lockes, long hanging downe behind, Knotted in blood and dust, for griefe of mind, That he in ods7 of armes was conquered; Yet in himselfe some comfort he did find, That him so noble knight had maystered, Whose bounty more then might, yet both he wondered.8

15

Which Guyon marking said, “Be nought agriev’d, Sir knight, that thus ye now subdewed arre: Was never man, who9 most conquestes atchiev’d But sometimes had the worse, and lost by warre,10 Yet shortly gaynd, that losse exceeded farre: Losse is no shame, nor to be lesse then foe,

1

The blow to the head has apparently disturbed Pyrochles’ syntax, but he means, “Don’t think that it is your own strength that has, by the unjust decree of fate (curse her spite!), thus laid me low.” Usually “maugre” means “despite.” 2 advizement: consideration. 3 maistring might: restraining force, refraining from attack.

4

equall die: even odds (the dice can fall equally either way). 5 trow: know, believe. 6 grated: grating, clenched. 7

ods: comparison, contest. I.e., he wondered at his generosity even more than at his strength, though at that, too. 9 I.e., even he who. 8

10

by warre: in battle.

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But to bee lesser, then himselfe, doth marre Both loosers lott, and victours prayse alsoe. Vaine others overthrowes,1 who selfe doth overthrow. 16

“Fly, O Pyrrhochles, fly the dreadfull warre, That in thy selfe thy lesser partes doe move,2 Outrageous anger, and woe working jarre, Direfull impatience, and hartmurdring love;3 Those, those thy foes, those warriours far remove, Which thee to endlesse bale captived lead. But sith in might thou didst my mercy prove,4 Of courtesie to mee the cause aread, That thee against me drew with so impetuous dread.”5

17

“Dreadlesse”6 (said he) “that shall I soone declare: It was complaind, that thou hadst done great tort7 Unto an aged woman, poore and bare, And thralled her in chaines with strong effort,8 Voide9 of all succour and needfull comfort: That ill beseemes thee, such as I thee see, To worke such shame. Therefore I thee exhort, To chaunge thy will, and set Occasion free, And to her captive sonne yield his first10 libertee.”

18

Thereat Sir Guyon smylde, “And is that all” (Said he) “that thee so sore displeased hath? Great mercy sure, for to enlarge11 a thrall, Whose freedom shall thee turne to greatest scath.12 Nath’lesse now quench thy whott emboyling wrath: Loe there they bee; to thee I yield them free.” Thereat he wondrous glad, out of the path Did lightly leape, where he them bound did see, And gan to breake the bands of their captivitee.

1

Vaine others overthrowes: in vain does he conquer others.

2

thy lesser partes doe move: your lower instincts (or bodily parts) incite. 3 I.e., the wrong kind of love––violent and excessive. 4 5

sith: since; prove: experience, test. dread: violence, dreadfulness.

6

Dreadlesse: doubtless, without fear. tort: wrong; see ii.18.8n. 8 thralled: bound; effort: force. 7

9

Voide: deprived. first: former. 11 enlarge: set loose. 12 scath: harm. 10

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19

Soone as Occasion felt her selfe untyde, Before her sonne could well assoyled1 bee, She to her use2 returnd, and streight defyde Both Guyon and Pyrrhochles: th’one (said shee) Bycause he wonne; the other because hee Was wonne:3 So matter did she make of nought, To stirre up strife, and garre4 them disagree: But soone as Furor was enlargd, she sought To kindle his quencht fyre, and thousand causes wrought.5

20

It was not long, ere she inflam’d him so, That he would algates with Pyrrhochles fight, And his redeemer chalengd for his foe, Because he had not well mainteind6 his right, But yielded had to that same straunger knight: Now gan Pyrrhochles wex as wood,7 as hee, And him affronted8 with impatient might: So both together fiers engrasped bee, Whyles Guyon standing by, their uncouth strife does see.

21

Him all that while Occasion did provoke Against Pyrrhochles, and new matter fram’d Upon the old, him stirring to bee wroke9 Of his late wronges, in which she oft him blam’d For suffering such abuse, as knighthood sham’d, And him dishabled10 quyte. But he was wise, Ne would with vaine occasions be inflam’d; Yet others she more urgent did devise: Yet nothing could him to impatience entise.

22

Their fell contention still increased more, And much thereby increased Furors might, That he his foe had hurt, and wounded sore, And him in blood and durt deformed11 quight.

1

6

2

7

assoyled: freed. use: usual habit. 3 wonne: beaten. 4 garre: cause, provoke. 5 causes wrought: invented bases of dispute.

mainteind: championed. wex as wood: grow as mad. 8 affronted: confronted. 9 wroke: avenged. 10 dishabled: shamed, belittled. 11 deformed: disfigured.

75

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His mother eke, more to augment his spight, Now brought to him a flaming fyer brond, Which she in Stygian lake,1 ay burning bright Had kindled: that she gave into his hond, That armd with fire, more hardly he mote him withstond. 23

Tho gan that villein wex so fiers and strong, That nothing might sustaine2 his furious forse; He cast him downe to ground, and all along Drew him through durt and myre without remorse, And fowly battered his comely corse,3 That Guyon much disdeignd4 so loathly sight. At last he was compeld to cry perforse, “Help, O Sir Guyon, helpe most noble knight, To ridd a wretched man from handes of hellish wight.”

24

The knight was greatly moved at his playnt, And gan him dight to succour his distresse, Till that the Palmer, by his grave restraynt, Him stayd from yielding pitifull redresse;5 And said, “Deare sonne, thy causelesse ruth represse, Ne let thy stout hart melt in pitty vayne: He that his sorow sought through wilfulnesse, And his foe fettred would release agayne, Deserves to taste his follies fruit, repented6 payne.”

25

Guyon obayd; So him away he drew From needlesse trouble of renewing fight Already fought, his voyage to poursew. But rash Pyrrhochles varlett, Atin hight, When late he saw his Lord in heavie7 plight, Under Sir Guyons puissaunt stroke to fall,

1

According to tradition it was not Styx but Phlegethon, another river of the underworld, that burned (see iv.41.7n.); hence “Stygian” here means “hellish.” The burning lake of hell is mentioned in Rev. 20.10–15. 2 sustaine: bear, resist.

3

corse: body. disdeignd: was indignant at. 5 I.e., stopped him from lending help out of pity. 6 repented: regretful. 7 heavie: grievous. 4

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Him deeming dead, as then he seemd in sight, Fledd fast away, to tell his funerall1 Unto his brother, whom Cymochles men did call. 26

He was a man of rare redoubted2 might, Famous throughout the world for warlike prayse,3 And glorious spoiles, purchast4 in perilous fight: Full many doughtie knightes he in his dayes Had doen to death, subdewde in equall frayes, Whose carkases, for terrour of his name, Of fowles and beastes he made the piteous prayes,5 And hong their conquerd armes for more defame On gallow trees,6 in honour of his dearest Dame.

27

His dearest Dame is that Enchaunteresse, The vyle Acrasia, that with vaine delightes, And ydle pleasures in her Bowre of Blisse,7 Does charme her lovers, and the feeble sprightes Can call out of the bodies of fraile wightes: Whom then she does transforme to monstrous hewes,8 And horribly misshapes with ugly sightes,9 Captiv’d eternally in yron mewes,10 And darksom dens, where Titan11 his face never shewes.

28

There Atin fownd Cymochles sojourning, To serve his Lemans love: for he by kynd,12 Was given all to lust and loose living, When ever his fiers handes he free mote fynd: And now he has pourd out his ydle mynd In daintie delices,13 and lavish joyes,

1

funerall: death. redoubted: feared, renowned. 3 prayse: repute. 4 purchast: earned. 5 prayes: prey; cf. Homer, Iliad, 1.4–5. 6 gallow trees: gallows, where convicts are executed. 7 On Acrasia and the Bower of Bliss, see i.51; they are revisited at length in Canto Twelve. The description that follows in stanzas 28–34 closely imitates the descrip2

tion of the garden of Armida in Tasso, Gerusalemme Liberata, Canto 16. 8 hewes: forms; cf. Circe in Homer, Odyssey, Book 10, who changes men to pigs. 9 sightes: appearances. 10 mewes: cages. 11 Titan: the sun. 12 Lemans love: lover’s pleasure; kynd: nature. 13 delices: delights.

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Having his warlike weapons cast behynd,1 And flowes in pleasures, and vaine pleasing toyes,2 Mingled emongst loose Ladies and lascivious boyes. 29

And over him, art3 stryving to compayre With nature, did an Arber greene dispred,4 Framed of wanton Yvie, flouring fayre, Through which the fragrant Eglantine did spred His prickling armes, entrayld5 with roses red, Which daintie odours round about them threw, And all within with flowres was garnished, That when myld Zephyrus 6 emongst them blew, Did breath out bounteous smels, and painted colors shew.

30

And fast7 beside, there trickled softly downe A gentle streame, whose murmuring wave did play Emongst the pumy stones, and made a sowne,8 To lull him soft a sleepe, that by it lay; The wearie Traveiler, wandring that way, Therein did often quench his thristy heat,9 And then by it his wearie limbes display,10 Whiles creeping slomber made him to forget His former payne, and wypt away his toilsom sweat.

31

And on the other syde a pleasaunt grove Was shott11 up high, full of the stately tree, That dedicated is t’Olympick Jove,12 And to his sonne Alcides, whenas hee

1

behynd: aside. toyes: trifles. 3 art: cultivation, human skill. 4 dispred: spread out. 5 entrayld: intertwined. All three plants are ambiguous: the ivy is fair but “wanton,” because it spreads so quickly and smotheringly; the Eglantine or sweetbriar is fragrant but prickly, as are the roses. 6 Zephyrus: the west wind. 7 fast: close. 2

8

pumy: pumice (a light, soft stone, in keeping with the rest of the bower); sowne: sound, though the spelling also suggests “swoon” (often spelled “swowne”). 9 thristy heat: heat and thirst. 10 display: spread out, splay, as again at 32.1. 11 shott: grown. 12 Jove: Jupiter, king of the gods, who is “Olympick” because he lives on Mount Olympus and also had a great temple at Olympia in southwestern Greece. The tree sacred to him is the oak.

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In Nemus gayned goodly victoree;1 Therein the mery birdes of every sorte Chaunted alowd thir chearefull harmonee: And made emongst them selves a sweete consort,2 That quickned3 the dull spright with musicall comfort. 32

There he him found all carelesly displaid, In secrete4 shadow from the sunny ray, On a sweet bed of lillies softly laid, Amidst a flock of Damzelles fresh and gay, That rownd about him dissolute did play Their wanton follies, and light meriment; Every of which did loosely disaray5 Her upper partes of meet habiliments,6 And shewd them naked, deckt with many ornaments.

33

And every of them strove, with most delights, Him to aggrate,7 and greatest pleasures shew; Some framd faire lookes, glancing like evening lights Others sweet wordes, dropping like honny dew;8 Some bathed kisses, and did soft embrew9 The sugred licour through his melting lips: One boastes her beautie, and does yield to vew Her dainty limbes above her tender hips; Another her out boastes, and all for tryall10 strips.

34

He, like an Adder, lurking in the weedes, His wandring thought in deepe desire does steepe, And his frayle eye with spoyle11 of beauty feedes; Sometimes he falsely faines himselfe to sleepe, Whiles through their lids his wanton eies do peepe, To steale a snatch of amorous conceipt,12

1 Alcides is Hercules, son of Jupiter, one of whose twelve labors was to slay the Nemean Lion. Usually he is associated not with the oak, but with the poplar tree. 2

consort: concert, fellowship. quickned: enlivened. 4 secrete: sheltered. 5 disaray: unclothe. 6 habiliments: garments. 3

7

aggrate: gratify. Cf. Belphoebe at iii.24.7, but also Prov. 5.3–4: “For the lippes of a strange woman drop as an honie combe . . . But the end of her is bitter as worme wood.” 9 embrew: pour (OED, citing this line). 10 all for tryall: to put all to the test. 11 spoyle: treasure, defiling. 12 snatch: glimpse; conceipt: fancy. 8

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Whereby close1 fire into his heart does creepe: So, he them deceives, deceivd in his deceipt, Made dronke with drugs of deare voluptuous receipt.2 35

Attin arriving there, when him he spyde, Thus in still waves3 of deepe delight to wade, Fiercely approching, to him lowdly cryde, “Cymochles; oh no, but Cymochles shade,4 In which that manly person late did fade, What is become of great Acrates sonne? Or where hath he hong up his mortall blade, That hath so many haughty conquests wonne? Is all his force forlorne,5 and all his glory donne?”

36

Then pricking him with his sharp-pointed dart, He saide; “Up, up, thou womanish weake knight, That here in Ladies lap entombed art, Unmindfull of thy praise and prowest6 might, And weetlesse7 eke of lately wrought despight, Whiles sad Pyrrhochles lies on sencelesse ground, And groneth out his utmost grudging spright,8 Through many a stroke, and many a streaming wound, Calling thy help in vaine, that here in joyes art dround.”

37

Suddeinly out of his delightfull dreame The man awoke, and would have questiond more; But he would not endure9 that wofull theame For to dilate at large,10 but urged sore With percing wordes, and pittifull implore,11 Him hasty to arise. As one affright With hellish feends, or Furies12 mad uprore, He then uprose, inflamd with fell despight, And called for his armes; for he would algates fight.

1

7

2

close: secret. deare . . . receipt: costly ingredients (recipe), dangerous reception.

weetlesse: ignorant. utmost grudging spright: last unwilling breath of life.

3

9

4

10

See iv.41.5n. shade: shadow, ghost. 5 forlorne: lost. 6 prowest: most valiant.

8

endure: permit, agree. dilate at large: expand upon at length. 11 implore: plea. 12 See ii.29.2n.

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38

They bene ybrought; he quickly does him dight, And lightly mounted, passeth on his way, Ne Ladies loves, ne sweete entreaties might Appease his heat, or hastie passage stay, For he has vowd, to beene avengd that day, (That day it selfe him seemed all too long:) On him, that did Pyrrhochles deare dismay: So proudly pricketh on his courser strong, And Attin ay him pricks with spurs of shame and wrong.

81

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Canto Six Guyon is of immodest Merth, led into loose desyre, Fights with Cymochles, whiles his brother burnes in furious fyre.

1

A Harder lesson, to learne Continence1 In joyous pleasure, then in grievous paine: For sweetnesse doth allure the weaker sence So strongly, that uneathes2 it can refraine From that, which feeble nature covets faine; But griefe and wrath, that be her enemies, And foes of life, she better can abstaine;3 Yet vertue vauntes in both her victories, And Guyon in them all shewes goodly maysteries.

2

Whom bold Cymochles traveiling4 to finde, With cruell purpose bent to wreake on him The wrath, which Atin kindled in his mind, Came to a river, by whose utmost brim5 Wayting to passe, he saw whereas did swim A long the shore, as swift as glaunce of eye, A litle Gondelay,6 bedecked trim With boughes and arbours7 woven cunningly, That like a litle forrest seemed outwardly.

3

And therein sate a Lady fresh and fayre, Making sweete solace8 to her selfe alone; Sometimes she song, as lowd as larke in ayre,

1

3

Continence: moderation, self-restraint; an Aristotelian term (eukrasia)—see Introduction, Section 3. The idea expressed in this stanza, that impetuous incontinence is more easily reformed than weak self-indulgence, is found in Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 1152a. 2 uneathes: scarcely, with difficulty.

abstaine: keep off. traveiling: traveling, laboring. 5 utmost brim: outer bank. 4

6

Gondelay: gondola, pleasure boat. boughes and arbours: branches and trellises. 8 solace: amusement. 7

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Sometimes she laught, as merry as Pope Jone,1 Yet was there not with her else any one, That to her might move cause of meriment: Matter of merth enough, though there were none She could devise, and thousand waies invent, To feede her foolish humour, and vaine jolliment.2 4

Which when far off Cymochles heard, and saw, He lowdly cald to such, as were abord, The little barke unto the shore to draw, And him to ferry over that deepe ford: The merry mariner unto his word Soone hearkned, and her painted bote streightway Turnd to the shore, where that same warlike Lord She in receiv’d; but Atin by no way She would admit, albe3 the knight her much did pray.

5

Eftsoones her shallow ship away did slide, More swift, then swallow sheres the liquid4 skye, Withouten oare or Pilot it to guide, Or winged canvas5 with the wind to fly, Onely she turnd a pin, and by and by6 It cut away upon the yielding wave, Ne cared she her course for to apply:7 For it was taught the way, which she would have, And both from rocks and flats it selfe could wisely save.

6

And all the way, the wanton Damsell found New merth, her passenger to entertaine: For she in pleasaunt purpose8 did abound, And greatly joyed merry tales to faine,9 Of which a store-house did with her remaine, Yet seemed, nothing well they her became;10

1

A legendary female pope, invoked especially by anti-Catholic writers in the sixteenth century; the phrase “merry as Pope Joan” appears to have been proverbial. The reference was removed in 1596 and subsequent editions. 2 humour: disposition; jolliment: frivolity. 3

albe: albeit, although.

4

sheres the liquid: cuts across the clear. winged canvas: i.e., sails. 6 by and by: at once. 7 apply: direct. 5

8

purpose: conversation. faine: invent. 10 I.e., yet they seemed utterly unbecoming to her. 9

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For all her wordes she drownd with laughter vaine, And wanted grace in utt’ring of the same, That turned all her pleasaunce to a scoffing1 game. 7

And other whiles vaine toyes2 she would devize, As her fantasticke3 wit did most delight, Sometimes her head she fondly4 would aguize With gaudy girlonds, or fresh flowrets dight About her necke, or rings of rushes plight;5 Sometimes to do him laugh, she would assay To laugh at shaking of the leaves light, Or to behold the water worke, and play About her little frigot,6 therein making way.

8

Her light behaviour, and loose dalliaunce Gave wondrous great contentment to the knight, That of his way he had no sovenaunce,7 Nor care of vow’d revenge, and cruell fight, But to weake wench did yield his martiall might. So easie was to quench his flamed minde With one sweete drop of sensuall delight. So easie is, t’appease the stormy winde Of malice in the calme of pleasaunt womankind.

9

Diverse discourses in their way they spent,8 Mongst which Cymochles of her questioned, Both what she was, and what that usage9 ment, Which in her cott10 she daily practized. “Vaine man” (saide she) “that wouldest be reckoned A straunger in thy home, and ignoraunt Of Phaedria11 (for so my name is red) Of Phaedria, thine owne fellow servaunt; For thou to serve Acrasia thy selfe doest vaunt.

1 pleasaunce: pleasantry; scoffing: negligible, despicable. 2 toyes: pastimes. 3 fantasticke: fanciful, extravagant. 4 fondly: foolishly. 5 plight: woven. 6 frigot: boat. 7 sovenaunce: remembrance.

8

spent: engaged in. usage: practice, habit. 10 cott: boat (or possibly “home”). 11 Phaedria: shining, joyful (Greek phaidros). But the name has dark connotations because of Phaedra, wife of Theseus, whose uncontrolled passion for her stepson Hippolytus led to tragedy. 9

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10

“In this wide Inland1 sea, that hight by name The Idle lake, my wandring ship I row, That knowes her port, and thether sayles by ayme,2 Ne care, ne feare I, how the wind do blow, Or whether swift I wend,3 or whether slow: Both slow and swift a like do serve my tourne,4 Ne swelling Neptune, ne lowd thundring Jove 5 Can chaunge my cheare,6 or make me ever mourne; My little boat can safely passe this perilous bourne.”7

11

Whiles thus she talked, and whiles thus she toyd, They were far past the passage, which he spake,8 And come unto an Island, waste and voyd,9 That floted in the midst of that great lake, There her small Gondelay her port did make, And that gay payre issewing on the shore Disburdned her. Their way they forward take Into the land, that lay them faire before, Whose pleasaunce she him shewd, and plentifull great store.

12

It was a chosen10 plot of fertile land, Emongst wide waves sett, like a litle nest, As if it had by Natures cunning hand, Bene choycely picked out from all the rest, And laid forth for ensample of the best: No dainty flowre or herbe, that growes on grownd, No arborett11 with painted blossomes drest, And smelling sweete, but there it might be fownd To bud out faire, and throwe her sweete smels al arownd.

13

No tree, whose braunches did not bravely12 spring; No braunch, whereon a fine bird did not sitt: No bird, but did her shrill notes sweetely sing;

1 Since “Inland” is a literal translation of “Mediterranean,” the Idle Lake has sometimes been read as in part a satirical comment on the habits of Mediterranean countries. 2 thether: thither; by ayme: by its own direction. 3

wend: move. tourne: purpose. 5 Neptune: the sea; Jove: the sky. 4

85

6 cheare: expression, disposition, cheerfulness. 7 bourne: river (combining two senses of the word: “boundary” and “brook”). 8

spake: had requested. waste and voyd: empty and deserted. 10 chosen: choice. 11 arborett: little tree, bush. 12 bravely: splendidly. 9

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No song but did containe a lovely ditt:1 Trees, braunches, birds, and songs were framed fitt, For to allure fraile mind to carelesse2 ease. Carelesse the man soone woxe, and his weake witt Was overcome of thing, that did him please; So pleased, did his wrathfull purpose faire appease. 14

Thus when shee had his eyes and sences fed With false delights, and fild3 with pleasures vayn, Into a shady dale she soft him led, And laid him downe upon a grassy playn; And her sweete selfe without dread, or disdayn, She sett beside, laying his head disarmd In her loose lap, it softly to sustain, Where soone he slumbred fearing not be harmd, The whils with a love lay she thus him sweetly charmd.

15

“Behold, O man, that toilesome paines doest take The flowrs, the fields, and all that pleasaunt growes, How they them selves doe thine ensample make, Whiles nothing envious4 nature them forth throwes Out of her fruitfull lap; how no man knowes, They spring, they bud, they blossome fresh and faire, And decke the world with their rich pompous5 showes; Yet no man for them taketh paines or care, Yet no man to them can his carefull paines compare.6

16

“The lilly, Lady of the flowring field, The flower deluce,7 her lovely Paramoure, Bid thee to them8 thy fruitlesse labors yield, And soone leave off this toylsome weary stoure;

1

ditt: ditty, air. carelesse: carefree, though the more usual sense is also present, especially in the following line.

2

3

fild: filled, defiled (Hamilton). nothing envious: not stingy. 5 pompous: magnificent. 6 Phaedria’s entire song is a parody of Jesus’ words from the Sermon on the Mount, Matt. 6.28–29: “And why care ye for rai4

ment? Learne, how the lilies of the field do growe: they labour not, nether spinne: Yet I say unto you, that even Solomon in all his glorie was not arayed like one of these.” The same chapter is recalled in the next canto; see vii.Arg.1n. 7 flower deluce: fleur-de-lis, iris. Since the lily is a symbol of chastity, it is ironic that Phaedria gives it to a lover (“Paramoure”). 8

to them: i.e., by their example.

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Loe loe how brave she decks her bounteous boure, With silkin curtens and gold coverletts, Therein to shrowd her sumptuous Belamoure,1 Yet nether spinnes nor cards,2 ne cares nor fretts, But to her mother Nature all her care she letts.3 17

“Why then doest thou, O man, that of them all Art Lord, and eke of nature Soveraine, Wilfully make thy selfe a wretched thrall, And waste thy joyous howres in needelesse paine, Seeking for daunger and adventures vaine? What bootes it al to have, and nothing use? Who shall him rew, that swimming in the maine,4 Will die for thrist, and water doth refuse? Refuse such fruitlesse toile, and present pleasures chuse.”

18

By this she had him lulled fast a sleepe, That of no worldly thing he care did take; Then she with liquors5 strong his eies did steepe, That nothing should him hastily awake: So she him lefte, and did her selfe betake Unto her boat again, with which she clefte The slouthfull wave of that great griesy6 lake; Soone shee that Island far behind her lefte, And now is come to that same place, where first she wefte.7

19

By this time was the worthy Guyon brought Unto the other side of that wide strond,8 Where she was rowing, and for passage sought: Him needed not long call, shee soone to hond Her ferry brought, where him she byding9 fond, With his sad guide; him selfe she tooke a boord,

1

Belamoure: “fair love,” lover. I.e., neither combs wool nor spins it.

5

3

liquors: liquids, potions. griesy: grim (and perhaps “greasy,” thick as oil or mud).

4

7

2

letts: leaves. rew: pity; maine: large body of water; since the word usually refers to the ocean, which is undrinkable, Phaedria’s example and her logic are suspect.

6

wefte: wove her way. strond: body of water. 9 byding: waiting. 8

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But the Blacke Palmer suffred still to stond, Ne would for price, or prayers once affoord,1 To ferry that old man over the perlous foord. 20

Guyon was loath to leave his guide behind, Yet being entred, might not backe retyre; For the flitt2 barke, obaying to her mind, Forth launched quickly, as she did desire, Ne gave him leave to bid that aged sire Adieu, but nimbly ran her wonted course Through the dull billowes thicke as troubled mire,3 Whom nether wind out of their seat4 could forse, Nor timely tides did drive out of their sluggish sourse.5

21

And by the way, as was her wonted guize,6 Her mery fitt shee freshly gan to reare,7 And did of joy and jollity devize, Her selfe to cherish,8 and her guest to cheare: The knight was courteous, and did not forebeare Her honest merth and pleasaunce to partake; But when he saw her toy, and gibe, and geare,9 And passe the bonds of modest merimake, Her dalliaunce he despisd, and follies did forsake.

22

Yet she still followed her former style, And said, and did all that mote him delight, Till they arrived in that pleasaunt Ile, Where sleeping late she lefte her other knight. But whenas Guyon of that land had sight, He wist him selfe amisse, and angry said; “Ah Dame, perdy ye have not doen me right, Thus to mislead mee, whiles I you obaid:10 Me litle needed from my right way to have straid.”

1

affoord: grant. flitt: swift. 3 troubled mire: churned mud. 2

4

seat: place. sourse: channel. 6 wonted guize: usual way. 5

7

fitt: mood; reare: display. cherish: endear, cheer. 9 toy, and gibe, and geare: flirt, and jest, and jeer. 10 obaid: submitted to. 8

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23

“Faire Sir” (quod she) “be not displeasd at all; Who fares on sea, may not commaund his way, Ne wind and weather at his pleasure call: The sea is wide, and easy for to stray; The wind unstable, and doth never stay. But here a while ye may in safety rest, Till season serve new passage to assay; Better safe port, then be in seas distrest.” Therewith she laught, and did her earnest end in jest.

24

But he halfe discontent, mote nathelesse Himselfe appease, and issewd forth on shore: The joyes whereof, and happy fruitfulnesse, Such as he saw, she gan him lay before,1 And all though pleasaunt, yet she made much more: The fields did laugh, the flowres did freshly spring, The trees did bud, and early blossomes bore, And all the quire of birds did sweetly sing, And told that gardins pleasures in their caroling.

25

And she more sweete, then any bird on bough, Would oftentimes emongst them beare a part,2 And strive to passe (as she could well enough) Their native musicke by her skilful art: So did she all, that might his constant hart Withdraw from thought of warlike enterprize, And drowne in dissolute delights apart, Where noise of armes, or vew of martiall guize Might not revive desire of knightly exercize.3

26

But he was wise, and wary of her will, And ever held his hand upon his hart: Yet would not seeme so rude, and thewed4 ill, As to despise so curteous seeming part, That gentle Lady did to him impart, But fairly tempring fond desire subdewd,5

1

4

2

5

lay before: point out. beare a part: sing part of the harmony. 3 exercize: activity.

89

thewed: mannered. I.e., but with good restraint repressed foolish desire (either to indulge himself or to be angry).

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And ever her desired to depart. She list not heare, but her disports1 poursewd, And ever bad him stay, till time the tide renewd. 27

And now by this, Cymochles howre was spent, That he awoke out of his ydle dreme, And shaking off his drowsy dreriment,2 Gan him avize,3 howe ill did him beseme, In slouthfull sleepe his molten hart to steme,4 And quench the brond5 of his conceived yre. Tho up he started, stird with shame extreme, Ne staied for his Damsell to inquire, But marched to the Strond, their passage to require.6

28

And in the way he with Sir Guyon mett, Accompanyde with Phaedria the faire, Eftsoones he gan to rage, and inly fret, Crying, “Let be that Lady debonaire,7 Thou recreaunt8 knight, and soone thy selfe prepaire To batteile, if thou meane her love to gayn: Loe, loe already how the fowles9 in aire Doe flocke, awaiting shortly to obtayn Thy carcas for their pray, the guerdon of thy payn.”10

29

And therewith all he fiersly at him flew, And with importune11 outrage him assayld; Who soone prepard to field,12 his sword forth drew, And him with equall valew countervayld:13 Their mightie strokes their haberieons dismayld,14 And naked made each others manly spalles;15

1 list: preferred, would; disports: diversions. 2 dreriment: sluggishness. 3 him avize: consider. 4 steme: dissolve. 5 brond: torch. 6 their: there; require: demand. 7 debonaire: pleasing, well-disposed (French de bon air); a term common to romance, as is the rest of Cymochles’ phraseology in this stanza.

8

recreaunt: cowardly, false. fowles: birds. 10 guerdon: reward; payn: efforts. 11 importune: impatient. 12 prepard to field: ready for battle. 13 valew countervayld: force fought back. 14 haberieons dismayld: tore the plates of armor (mail) off their habergeons, a protective covering for the torso. 15 spalles: shoulders (Italian spalle). 9

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The mortall stele despiteously entayld1 Deepe in their flesh, quite through the yron walles, That a large purple stream adown their giambeux2 falles. 30

Cymocles, that had never mett before, So puissant foe, with envious despight His prowd presumed3 force increased more, Disdeigning to bee held so long in fight; Sir Guyon grudging4 not so much his might, As those unknightly raylinges,5 which he spoke, With wrathfull fire his corage kindled bright, Thereof devising shortly to be wroke, And doubling all his powres, redoubled every stroke.

31

Both of them high attonce their hands enhaunst,6 And both attonce their huge blowes down did sway;7 Cymochles sword on Guyons shield yglaunst, And thereof nigh one quarter sheard away; But Guyons angry blade so fiers did play8 On th’others helmett, which as Titan9 shone, That quite it clove his plumed crest in tway,10 And bared all his head unto the bone; Wherewith astonisht,11 still he stood, as sencelesse stone.

32

Still as he stood, fayre Phaedria, that beheld That deadly daunger, soone atweene them ran; And at their feet her selfe most humbly feld,12 Crying with pitteous voyce, and count’nance wan; “Ah well away,13 most noble Lords, how can Your cruell eyes endure so pitteous sight, To shed your lives on ground? wo worth14 the man, That first did teach the cursed steele to bight In his owne flesh, and make way to the living spright.

1

8

2

9

despiteously entayld: pitilessly cut. giambeux: leg-armor; cf. Menelaus in Homer, Iliad, 4.146–47. 3 presumed: presumptuous. 4 grudging: begrudging, taking offense at. 5 raylinges: insults. 6 enhaunst: raised. 7 sway: swing.

play: act, work. Titan: the sun. 10 in tway: in half. 11 astonisht: stunned. 12 feld: cast down. 13 well away: alas. 14 wo worth: may ill befall.

91

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33

“If ever love of Lady did empierce Your yron brestes, or pittie could find place, Withhold your bloody handes from battaill fierce, And sith for me ye fight, to me this grace Both yield, to stay your deadly stryfe a space.”1 They stayd a while: and forth she gan proceed: “Most wretched woman, and of wicked race, That am the authour2 of this hainous deed, And cause of death betweene two doughtie knights do breed.

34

“But if for me ye fight, or me will serve, Not this rude kynd of battaill, nor these armes Are meet, the which doe men in bale to sterve,3 And doolefull sorrow heape with deadly harmes: Such cruell game my scarmoges4 disarmes: Another warre, and other weapons I Doe love, where love does give his sweet Alarmes, Without bloodshed, and where the enimy Does yield unto his foe a pleasaunt victory.

35

“Debatefull strife, and cruell enmity The famous name of knighthood fowly shend; But lovely peace, and gentle amity, And in Amours the passing howres to spend, The mightie martiall handes doe most commend; Of love they ever greater glory bore,5 Then of their armes: Mars is Cupidoes frend,6 And is for Venus loves renowmed more, Then all his wars and spoiles, the which he did of yore.”

36

Therewith she sweetly smyld. They though full bent,7 To prove extremities8 of bloody fight, Yet at her speach their rages gan relent,

1

this grace . . . yield: grant this favor; a space: a while. 2 authour: origin. 3 in bale to sterve: woefully to die. 4

scarmoges: skirmishes; i.e., amorous contests or tusslings, as she explains in the following lines.

5 I.e., warriors (“martiall handes”) have always won greater glory by love. 6 Mars, the god of war, is Cupid’s friend in that he is the lover of Venus, mother of Cupid and goddess of love. 7 8

full bent: wholly intent. prove extremities: go to all lengths.

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93

And calme the sea of their tempestuous spight, Such powre have pleasing wordes: such is the might Of courteous clemency in gentle hart. Now after all was ceast, the Faery knight Besought that Damzell suffer him depart, And yield him ready passage to that other part.1 37

She no lesse glad, then he desirous was Of his departure thence; for of her joy And vaine delight she saw he light did pas,2 A foe of folly and immodest toy, Still solemne sad, or still disdainfull coy,3 Delighting all in armes and cruell warre, That her sweet peace and pleasures did annoy,4 Troubled with terrour and unquiet jarre, That she well pleased was thence to amove him farre.

38

Tho him she brought abord, and her swift bote Forthwith directed to that further strand;5 The which on the dull waves did lightly flote And soone arrived on the shallow sand, Where gladsome Guyon salied6 forth to land, And to that Damsell thankes gave for reward. Upon that shore he spyed Atin stand, There by his maister left, when late he far’d In Phaedrias flitt barck over that perlous shard.7

39

Well could he him remember, sith of late He with Pyrrhochles sharp debatement8 made; Streight gan he him revyle, and bitter rate,9 As Shepheardes curre, that in darke evenings shade Hath tracted forth some salvage beastes trade;10 “Vile Miscreaunt”11 (said he) “whether dost thou flye

1

that other part: the other side. light did pas: made light, was disregardful. 3 coy: aloof. 4 annoy: disturb. 5 strand: shore. 6 salied: went, leaped (Hamilton). 2

7 shard: dividing water (OED, citing this line). 8 debatement: struggle. 9 rate: berate. 10 I.e., has followed the track of some wild beast. 11 Miscreaunt: rascal.

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The shame and death, which will thee soone invade?1 What coward hand shall doe thee next2 to dye, That art thus fowly fledd from famous enimy?” 40

With that he stifly shooke his steelhead dart: But sober Guyon, hearing him so rayle, Though somewhat moved in his mightie hart, Yet with strong reason maistred passion fraile, And passed fayrely3 forth. He turning taile, Backe to the strond retyrd, and there still stayd, Awaiting passage, which him late did faile; The whiles Cymochles with that wanton mayd The hasty heat of his avowd revenge delayd.

41

Whylest there the varlet stood, he saw from farre An armed knight, that towardes him fast ran, He ran on foot, as if in lucklesse warre His forlorne4 steed from him the victour wan; He seemed breathlesse, hartlesse,5 faint, and wan, And all his armour sprinckled was with blood, And soyld with durtie gore, that no man can Discerne the hew thereof. He never stood,6 But bent his hastie course towardes the ydle flood.

42

The varlett saw, when to the flood he came, How without stop or stay he fiersly lept, And deepe him selfe beducked7 in the same, That in the lake his loftie crest was stept,8 Ne of his safetie seemed care he kept, But with his raging armes he rudely flasht,9 The waves about, and all his armour swept, That all the blood and filth away was washt, Yet still he bet10 the water, and the billowes dasht.

1

6

2

7

invade: overtake. doe thee next: cause you soon. 3 fayrely: peacefully. 4 forlorne: lost. 5 hartlesse: dispirited.

stood: stopped. beducked: plunged. 8 stept: steeped. 9 flasht: splashed. 10 bet: beat.

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43

Atin drew nigh, to weet, what it mote bee; For much he wondred at that uncouth sight; Whom should he, but his own deare Lord, there see, His owne deare Lord Pyrrhochles, in sad plight, Ready to drowne him selfe for fell despight. “Harrow now out, and well away,”1 he cryde, “What dismall day hath lent his cursed light, To see my Lord so deadly damnifyde?2 Pyrrhochles, O Pyrrhochles, what is thee betyde?”

44

“I burne, I burne, I burne,”3 then lowd he cryde, “O how I burne with implacable fyre, Yet nought can quench mine inly flaming syde,4 Nor sea of licour cold, nor lake of myre,5 Nothing but death can doe me to respyre.”6 “Ah be it” (said he) “from Pyrrhochles farre After pursewing death once to requyre,7 Or think, that ought those puissant hands may marre:8 Death is for wretches borne under unhappy9 starre.”

45

“Perdye, then is it fitt for me” (said he) “That am, I weene, most wretched man alive, Burning in flames, yet no flames can I see, And dying dayly, dayly yet revive: O Atin, helpe to me last10 death to give.” The varlet at his plaint was grieved so sore, That his deepe wounded hart in two did rive,11 And his owne health remembring now no more, Did follow that ensample, which he blam’d afore.

46

Into the lake he lept, his Lord to ayd, (So Love the dread of daunger doth despise) And of him catching hold him strongly stayd

1

Harrow, out, well away: all exclamations of distress: alas, alack!

2 3 4

damnifyde: injured, ruined. Cf. iv.38.5 and iv.41.2n.

inly flaming syde: fiery inside. 5 licour: water; myre: mud. 6 respyre: breathe, live again.

95

7

I.e., ever to seek for swift death. I.e., that anything can overcome your strength. 8 9

unhappy: unfortunate; see ii.2.1 and n. last: conclusive, at last. 11 rive: split. 10

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From drowning. But more happy1 he, then wise Of that seas nature did him not avise. The waves thereof so slow and sluggish were, Engrost with mud, which did them fowle agrise,2 That every weighty thing they did upbeare, Ne ought mote ever sinck downe to the bottom there. 47

Whiles thus they strugled in that ydle wave, And strove in vaine, the one him selfe to drowne, The other both from drowning for to save, Lo, to that shore one in an auncient gowne, Whose hoary locks great gravitie did crowne, Holding in hand a goodly arming sword,3 By fortune came, ledd with the troublous sowne:4 Where drenched deepe he fownd in that dull ford The carefull5 servaunt, stryving with his raging Lord.

48

Him Atin spying, knew right well of yore, And lowdly cald, “Help helpe, O Archimage, To save my Lord, in wretched plight forlore; Helpe with thy hand, or with thy counsell sage: Weake handes, but counsell is most strong in age.” Him when the old man saw, he woundred sore,6 To see Pyrrhochles there so rudely rage: Yet sithens7 helpe, he saw, he needed more Then pitty, he in hast approched to the shore.

49

And cald, “Pyrrhochles, what is this, I see? What hellish fury hath at earst8 thee hent? Furious ever I thee knew to bee, Yet never in this straunge astonishment.”9 “These flames, these flames” (he cryde) “do me torment.” “What flames” (quoth he) “when I thee present see,

1 happy: lucky (as explained in the following lines). 2 Engrost: thickened; agrise: render horrible or “griesy” (see above, 18.7 and n.). 3 arming sword: battle sword. 4 sowne: sound.

5

carefull: caring, troubled. woundred sore: wondered greatly. 7 sithens: since. 8 at earst: just, now. 9 astonishment: confusion, turmoil. 6

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In daunger rather to be drent, then brent?”1 “Harrow, the flames, which me consume” (said hee) “Ne can be quencht, within my secret bowelles2 bee. 50

“That cursed man, that cruel feend of hell, Furor, oh Furor hath me thus bedight:3 His deadly woundes within my livers4 swell, And his whott fyre burnes in mine entralles5 bright, Kindled through his infernall brond of spight, Sith late with him I batteill vaine would boste, That now I weene Joves dreaded thunder light6 Does scorch not halfe so sore, nor damned ghoste In flaming Phlegeton does not so felly roste.”7

51

Which when as Archimago heard, his griefe He knew right well, and him attonce disarmd: Then searcht his secret woundes, and made a priefe8 Of every place, that was with bruzing harmd, Or with the hidden fier inly warmd. Which doen, he balmes and herbes thereto applyde, And evermore with mightie spels them charmd, That in short space he has them qualifyde,9 And him restor’d to helth, that would have algates10 dyde.

1

drent, then brent: drowned than burned. secret bowelles: inner organs. 3 bedight: rendered. 4 The liver was considered the seat of passion; compare for instance Shakespeare, Twelfth Night, 1.1.36. 5 entralles: entrails. 2

6

I.e., the dreaded lightning-bolt of Jupiter. felly roste: terribly burn; on Phlegethon see iv.41.7n. 7

8 searcht: probed; made a priefe: examined, tested. 9 qualifyde: soothed. 10 algates: otherwise.

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Canto Seven Guyon findes Mamon in a delve,1 sunning his threasure hore:2 Is by him tempted, and led downe, To see his secrete store.

1

As Pilot well expert in perilous wave, That to a stedfast starre his course hath bent,3 When foggy mistes, or cloudy tempests have The faithfull light of that faire lampe yblent,4 And cover’d heaven with hideous dreriment,5 Upon his card and compas firmes6 his eye, The maysters of his long experiment,7 And to them does the steddy helme apply, Bidding his winged vessell fairely forward fly.

2

So Guyon having lost his trustie guyde, Late left beyond that Ydle lake, proceedes Yet on his way, of none accompanyde; And evermore himselfe with comfort feedes, Of his owne vertues, and praise-worthie deedes. So long he yode,8 yet no adventure found,

1 delve: hollow, pit. “Mammon” was originally the Aramaic word for “riches.” It appears in the New Testament at Matt. 6.24 and Luke 16.9–13, and was taken by medieval commentators to be the name of the devil of wealth or covetousness (the “Money God,” as he is called below at 39.1). Spenser’s Mammon thus takes part in a tradition of personification. Guyon’s visit to Mammon’s cave has two major precedents: the visit of the epic hero to the underworld (Homer, Odyssey, Book 11; Virgil, Aeneid, Book 6; Dante, Inferno), and the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness by Satan (Matt. 4.1–11; Luke 4.1–13). Many critics view Guyon’s adventure in Mam-

mon’s cave as a pivotal event in Book Two; see especially Berger, who points out that Guyon “dominates the action” of the book up through this episode but is far less active in the remaining five cantos (Berger, 5). 2 hore: ancient, mouldy. 3 to: according to (as again in line 8); bent: directed. 4 yblent: blinded, blotted out. 5 dreriment: darkness. 6 card: chart; firmes: fixes. 7 maysters: guides; experiment: trial, experience. 8 yode: went.

98

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Which fame of her shrill trompet worthy reedes: For still he traveild1 through wide wastfull ground, That nought but desert wildernesse shewed all around. 3

At last he came unto a gloomy glade, Cover’d with boughes and shrubs from heavens light, Whereas he sitting found in secret shade An uncouth, salvage, and uncivile wight, Of griesly hew,2 and fowle ill favour’d sight; His face with smoke was tand and eies were bleard, His head and beard with sout3 were ill bedight, His cole-blacke hands did seeme to have ben seard In smythes fire-spitting forge, and nayles like clawes appeard.

4

His yron cote all overgrowne with rust, Was underneath enveloped with gold, Whose glistring glosse darkned with filthy dust, Well yet appeared, to have beene of old A worke of rich entayle, and curious mould,4 Woven with antickes5 and wyld ymagery: And in his lap a masse of coyne he told,6 And turned upside downe, to feede his eye And covetous desire with his huge threasury.7

5

And round about him lay on every side Great heapes of gold, that never could be spent: Of which some were rude owre,8 not purifide Of Mulcibers devouring element;9 Some others were new driven, and distent10 Into great Ingowes,11 and to wedges square; Some in round plates withouten moniment:12 But most were stampt, and in their metal bare The antique shapes of kings and kesars13 straung and rare.

1

8

2

9

traveild: traveled, labored. griesly hew: horrible aspect. 3 sout: soot. 4 entayle: carving; mould: design. 5 antickes: strange shapes. 6 told: counted. 7 threasury: treasure.

rude owre: unrefined ore. I.e., fire; Mulciber is another name for Vulcan, god of smiths. 10 driven: beaten; distent: shaped. 11 Ingowes: ingots. 12 moniment: mark. 13 kesars: emperors.

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6

Soone as he Guyon saw, in great affright And haste he rose, for to remove aside Those pretious hils from straungers envious sight, And downe them poured through an hole full wide, Into the hollow earth, them there to hide. But Guyon lightly to him leaping, stayd His hand, that trembled, as one terrifyde; And though him selfe were at the sight dismayd, Yet him perforce restraynd, and to him doubtfull 1 sayd.

7

“What art thou man, (if man at all thou art) That here in desert hast thine habitaunce,2 And these rich hils of welth doest hide apart From the worldes eye, and from her right usaunce?”3 Thereat with staring eyes fixed askaunce,4 In great disdaine, he answerd, “Hardy Elfe,5 That darest vew my direfull countenaunce, I read thee rash, and heedlesse of thy selfe, To trouble my still seate, and heapes of pretious pelfe.6

8

“God of the world and worldlings I me call, Great Mammon, greatest god below the skye, That of my plenty poure out unto all, And unto none my graces do envye:7 Riches, renowme, and principality,8 Honour, estate,9 and all this worldes good, For which men swinck10 and sweat incessantly, Fro me do flow into an ample flood, And in the hollow earth have their eternall brood.11

9

“Wherefore if me thou deigne to serve and sew,12 At thy commaund lo all these mountaines bee; Or if to thy great mind, or greedy vew

1

doubtfull: doubtful, fearful (depending on whether it describes Guyon or Mammon). 2 habitaunce: dwelling. The setting, a “desert wildernesse” (above, 2.9), recalls the temptation of Jesus (see above, Arg.1.n.). 3 The correct use (“right usaunce”) of money is to be circulated. 4 askaunce: aside (suggesting scorn or mistrust).

5

See i.1.6n. still seate: secure throne; pelfe: money, riches. 7 envye: begrudge. 8 principality: sovereignty, power. 9 estate: position, dignity. 10 swinck: toil. 11 brood: source, breeding ground. 12 deigne: agree; sew: follow. 6

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All these may not suffise, there shall to thee Ten times so much be nombred francke and free.”1 “Mammon” (said he) “thy godheads vaunt is vaine, And idle offers of thy golden fee; To them, that covet such eye-glutting gaine, Proffer thy giftes, and fitter servaunts entertaine.2 10

“Me ill besits, that in derdoing3 armes, And honours suit4 my vowed daies do spend, Unto thy bounteous baytes, and pleasing charmes, With which weake men thou witchest,5 to attend: Regard of worldly mucke6 doth fowly blend, And low abase the high heroicke spright, That joyes for crownes and kingdomes to contend; Faire shields, gay steedes, bright armes be my delight: Those be the riches fit for an advent’rous knight.”

11

“Vaine glorious Elfe” (said he) “doest not thou weet, That money can thy wantes at will supply? Sheilds, steeds, and armes, and all things for thee meet It can purvay in twinckling of an eye;7 And crownes and kingdomes to thee multiply. Doe not I kings create, and throw the crowne Sometimes to him, that low in dust doth ly? And him that raignd, into his rowme8 thrust downe, And whom I lust,9 do heape with glory and renowne?”

12

“All otherwise” (saide he) “I riches read, And deeme them roote of all disquietnesse;10 First got with guile, and then preserv’d with dread,11 And after spent with pride and lavishnesse, Leaving behind them griefe and heavinesse.12

1

nombred francke and free: counted out free of obligation. 2 entertaine: hire, maintain. 3 besits: suits, becomes; derdoing: daring; see iv.42.3 and n. 4

honours suit: pursuit of honor, honorable suit (of armor). 5 witchest: bewitch. 6 mucke: filth.

7

Cf. Luke 4.5: “Then the devil toke him up into an high mountaine, and shewed him all the kingdomes of the worlde, in the twinkeling of an eye.” 8 rowme: place. 9 lust: wish. 10 Cf. 1 Tim. 6.10: “For the desire of money is the roote of all evil.” 11 preserv’d with dread: kept with fear. 12

heavinesse: sorrow.

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Infinite mischiefes of them doe arize, Strife, and debate, bloodshed, and bitternesse, Outrageous wrong, and hellish covetize, That noble heart in great dishonour doth despize. 13

“Ne thine be kingdomes, ne the scepters thine; But realmes and rulers thou doest both confound,1 And loyall truth to treason doest incline;2 Witnesse the guiltlesse blood pourd oft on ground, The crowned often slaine, the slayer cround, The sacred Diademe3 in peeces rent, And purple robe gored4 with many a wound; Castles surprizd, great citties sackt and brent:5 So mak’st thou kings, and gaynest wrongfull government.

14

“Long were to tell the troublous stormes, that tosse The private state,6 and make the life unsweet: Who swelling sayles in Caspian sea doth crosse, And in frayle wood on Adrian gulf doth fleet,7 Doth not, I weene, so many evils meet.” Then Mammon wexing wroth, “And why then,” sayd, “Are mortall men so fond and undiscreet,8 So evill thing to seeke unto their ayd, And having not complaine, and having it upbrayd?”9

15

“Indeede” (quoth he) “through fowle intemperaunce, Frayle men are oft captiv’d to covetise: But would they thinke, with how small allowaunce Untroubled Nature doth her selfe suffise, Such superfluities they would despise, Which with sad cares empeach10 our native joyes:

1

confound: destroy. incline: turn, convert. 3 Diademe: crown (“sacred” because it represents divine right). 4 gored: torn, bloodied; purple is the color of royalty. 5 surprizd: attacked by surprise; brent: burned. 2

6

I.e., the state of private citizens, as opposed to the kings of the previous stanza. 7 fleet: sail. Both the Caspian and Adriatic (“Adrian”) seas were traditionally considered rough and dangerous. 8 undiscreet: undiscerning. 9 upbrayd: despise (but keep having it nonetheless). 10 empeach: hinder.

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103

At the well head the purest streames arise: But mucky filth his braunching armes annoyes,1 And with uncomely weedes the gentle wave accloyes.2 16

“The antique world, in his first flowring youth, Fownd no defect in his Creators grace, But with glad thankes, and unreproved truth,3 The guifts of soveraine bounty did embrace: Like Angels life was then mens happy cace;4 But later ages pride, like corn-fed steed,5 Abusd her plenty, and fat swolne encreace To all licentious lust,6 and gan exceed The measure of her meane,7 and naturall first need.

17

“Then gan a cursed hand the quiet wombe Of his great Grandmother8 with steele to wound, And the hid treasures in her sacred tombe,9 With Sacriledge to dig. Therein he fownd Fountaines of gold and silver to abownd, Of which the matter of his huge desire And pompous pride eftsoones he did compownd; Then avarice gan through his veines inspire10 His greedy flames, and kindled life-devouring fire.”

18

“Sonne” (said he then) “lett be thy bitter scorne, And leave the rudenesse11 of that antique age To them, that liv’d therin in state forlorne; Thou that doest live in later times, must wage12 Thy workes for wealth, and life for gold engage.13 If then thee list my offred grace to use,

1

annoyes: disturbs, dirties. accloyes: chokes. 3 unreproved truth: perfect honesty or faith. 4 cace: state. Spenser’s description of the golden age, and of the subsequent development of mining (next stanza), derives from Ovid, Metamorphoses, 1.90–150. 5 A horse fed on grain (“corn”) was a proverbial emblem of being spoiled. 6 The “later age” misused its store and wealth (“Abusd her plenty and . . . encreace”), 2

now grown excessive (“fat swolne”), for all its lawless desires (“licentious lust”). 7 The golden mean, as in ii.Arg.2. 8 I.e., the earth. 9 The gold and silver are in a tomb in the sense that they are buried underground. 10 inspire: breathe. 11 rudenesse: primitiveness. 12 wage: perform, hire out. 13 engage: pawn.

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Take what thou please of all this surplusage; If thee list not, leave have thou to refuse: But thing refused, doe not afterward accuse.”1 19

“Me list not” (said the Elfin knight) “receave Thing offred, till I know it well be gott,2 Ne wote I, but thou didst these goods bereave3 From rightfull owner by unrighteous lott,4 Or that bloodguiltinesse or guile them blott.”5 “Perdy” (quoth he) “yet never eie did vew, Ne tong did tell, ne hand these handled not,6 But safe I have them kept in secret mew,7 From hevens light, and powre of al which them poursew.”

20

“What secret place” (quoth he) “can safely hold So huge a masse, and hide from heavens eie? Or where hast thou thy wonne,8 that so much gold Thou canst preserve from wrong and robbery?” “Come thou” (quoth he) “and see.” So by and by Through that thick covert he him led, and fownd A darkesome way, which no man could descry, That deep descended through the hollow grownd, And was with dread and horror compassed arownd.

21

At length they came into a larger space, That stretcht it selfe into an ample playne, Through which a beaten broad high way did trace,9 That streight did lead to Plutoes griesly rayne:10 By that wayes side, there sate internall11 Payne, And fast beside him sat tumultuous Strife:

1

8

2

9

accuse: i.e., be angry for not having. well be gott: is well gotten. 3 bereave: steal. 4 lott: allotment. 5 blott: sully. 6 Cf. 1 Cor. 2.9: “But as it is written, The things which eye hathe not sene, nether eare hathe heard, nether came into mans heart, are, which God hathe prepared for them that love him.” 7 mew: hiding place.

wonne: dwelling place. Cf. Matt. 7.13: “it is the wide gate, and broad waye that leadeth to destruction: and manie there be which go in thereat.” The “wide gate” appears at 24.6, below. 10

rayne: kingdom. Pluto is the classical god of the underworld and of riches. 11 The 1596 edition reads “infernall” (i.e., hellish), but this reading also makes sense: private distress or anxiety is paired with external Strife in the next line.

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The one in hand an yron whip did strayne,1 The other brandished a bloody knife, And both did gnash their teeth, and both did threten life. 22

On thother side in one consort2 there sate, Cruell Revenge, and rancorous Despight, Disloyall Treason, and hart-burning Hate, But gnawing Gealosy out of their sight Sitting alone, his bitter lips did bight, And trembling Feare still to and fro did fly, And found no place, wher safe he shroud3 him might, Lamenting Sorrow did in darknes lye. And shame his ugly face did hide from living eye.

23

And over them sad horror with grim hew, Did alwaies sore, beating his yron wings; And after him Owles and Night-ravens flew, The hatefull messengers of heavy things, Of death and dolor4 telling sad tidings; Whiles sad Celeno, sitting on a clifte,5 A song of bale and bitter sorrow sings, That hart of flint a sonder could have rifte:6 Which having ended, after him she flyeth swifte.

24

All these before the gates of Pluto lay, By whom they passing, spake unto them nought. But th’Elfin knight with wonder all the way Did feed his eyes, and fild his inner thought. At last him to a litle dore he brought, That to the gate of Hell, which gaped wide, Was next adjoyning, ne them parted nought:7 Betwixt them both was but a litle stride, That did the house of Richesse from hellmouth divide.

1

strayne: grasp. consort: company. 3 shroud: hide. 4 dolor: grief, pain. 2

5 clifte: cliff. Celeno is one of the harpies, a group of violent bird-women; according to

Virgil, she is a prophetess of doom (see Aeneid, 3.245–46). 6 rifte: broken. 7 them parted nought: nothing stood between them.

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106 25

Before the dore sat selfe-consuming Care, Day and night keeping wary watch and ward,1 For feare least Force or Fraud should unaware Breake in, and spoile2 the treasure there in gard: Ne would he suffer Sleepe once thether-ward Approch, albe his drowsy den were next;3 For next to death is Sleepe to be compard: Therefore his house is unto his annext; Here Sleep, ther Richesse, and Helgate them both betwext.4

26

So soone as Mammon there arrivd, the dore To him did open, and affoorded way; Him followed eke Sir Guyon evermore, Ne darkenesse him, ne daunger might dismay. Soone as he entred was, the dore streight way Did shutt, and from behind it forth there lept An ugly feend, more fowle then dismall day,5 The which with monstrous stalke6 behind him stept, And ever as he went, dew watch upon him kept.

27

Well hoped hee, ere long that hardy guest, If ever covetous hand, or lustfull eye, Or lips he layd on thing, that likte7 him best, Or ever sleepe his eiestrings did untye, Should be his pray. And therefore still on hye He over him did hold his cruell clawes, Threatning with greedy gripe8 to doe him dye And rend in peeces with his ravenous pawes, If ever he transgrest the fatall Stygian9 lawes.

28

That houses forme within was rude and strong, Lyke an huge cave, hewne out of rocky clifte, From whose rough vaut the ragged breaches10 hong, Embost with massy gold of glorious guifte,11

1

ward: guard. spoile: plunder. 3 next: nearby. 4 betwext: between. 5 dismall day: day of bad omen, the original meaning of “dismal,” from Latin dies mali (day of evil). 2

6

stalke: stride, pursuit.

7

likte: pleased. gripe: grip, grasp. 9 Stygian: hellish; see v.22.7n. 10 vaut: vault, roof; breaches: projections of broken rock (?). 11 I.e., decorated with solid gold of a brilliant nature or value. 8

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And with rich metall loaded every rifte, That heavy ruine1 they did seeme to threatt; And over them Arachne2 high did lifte Her cunning web, and spred her subtile3 nett, Enwrapped in fowle smoke and clouds more black then Jett. 29

Both roofe, and floore, and walls were all of gold, But overgrowne with dust and old decay, And hid in darkenes, that none could behold The hew thereof: for vew of cherefull day Did never in that house it selfe display, But a faint shadow of uncertein light; Such as a lamp, whose life does fade away: Or as the Moone cloathed with clowdy night, Does shew to him, that walkes in feare and sad affright.

30

In all that rowme4 was nothing to be seene, But huge great yron chests and coffers strong, All bard with double bends,5 that none could weene Them to efforce6 by violence or wrong: On every side they placed were along. But all the grownd with sculs was scattered, And dead mens bones, which round about were flong, Whose lives, it seemed, whilome there were shed,7 And their vile carcases now left unburied.

31

They forward passe, ne Guyon yet spoke word, Till that they came unto an yron dore, Which to them opened of his owne accord, And shewd of richesse such exceeding store, As eie of man did never see before, Ne ever could within one place be fownd, Though all the wealth, which is, or was of yore, Could gathered be through all the world arownd, And that above were added to that under grownd.

1

5

2

6

ruine: collapse, destruction. Arachne: the spider; see xii.77.7n. 3 subtile: delicate, deceptive. 4 rowme: room, place.

bard: barred, bound; bends: (metal) bands. efforce: force open. 7 shed: lost.

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32

The charge thereof unto a covetous Spright Commaunded1 was, who thereby did attend, And warily awaited day and night, From other covetous feends it to defend, Who it to rob and ransacke did intend. Then Mammon turning to that warriour, said; “Loe here the worldes blis, loe here the end, To which al men doe ayme, rich to be made: Such grace now to be happy, is before thee laid.”

33

“Certes” (sayd he) “I n’ill2 thine offred grace, Ne to be made so happy doe intend: Another blis before mine eyes I place, Another happines, another end. To them, that list, these base regardes I lend:3 But I in armes, and in atchievements brave, Do rather choose my flitting4 houres to spend, And to be Lord of those, that riches have, Then them to have my selfe, and be their servile sclave.”5

34

Thereat the feend his gnashing teeth did grate, And griev’d, so long to lacke his greedie pray; For well he weened, that so glorious bayte Would tempt his guest, to take thereof assay: Had he so doen, he had him snatcht away, More light then Culver in the Faulcons fist.6 Eternall God thee save from such decay. But whenas Mammon saw his purpose mist, Him to entrap unwares another way he wist.

35

Thence forward he him ledd, and shortly brought Unto another rowme, whose dore forthright, To him did open, as it had beene taught: Therein an hundred raunges weren pight,7 And hundred fournaces all burning bright; By every fournace many feendes did byde,8

1

5

2

6

Commaunded: entrusted. n’ill: do not wish. 3 regardes: concerns; lend: give, leave. 4 flitting: fleeting.

sclave: slave. Culver: dove; fist: talon. 7 raunges: fireplaces; pight: placed. 8 byde: stay.

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Deformed creatures, horrible in sight, And every feend his busie paines1 applyde, To melt the golden metall, ready to be tryde.2 36

One with great bellowes gathered filling ayre, And with forst wind the fewell did inflame; Another did the dying bronds repayre3 With yron tongs, and sprinckled ofte the same With liquid waves, fiers Vulcans 4 rage to tame, Who maystring them, renewd his former heat; Some scumd the drosse,5 that from the metall came. Some stird the molten owre with ladles great; And every one did swincke, and every one did sweat.

37

But when an earthly wight they present saw, Glistring in arms and battailous aray, From their whot work they did themselves withdraw To wonder at the sight: for till that day, They never creature saw, that cam that way. Their staring eyes sparckling with fervent6 fyre, And ugly shapes did nigh the man dismay, That were it not for shame, he would retyre,7 Till that him thus bespake their soveraine Lord and syre.

38

“Behold, thou Faeries sonne, with mortall eye, That8 living eye before did never see: The thing, that thou didst crave so earnestly, To weet, whence all the wealth late shewd by mee, Proceeded, lo now is reveald to thee. Here is the fountaine of the worldes good: Now therefore, if thou wilt enriched bee, Avise thee well, and chaunge thy wilfull mood, Least thou perhaps hereafter wish, and be withstood.”9

1

paines: efforts. tryde: refined. 3 bronds: embers; repayre: stoke, revive. 4 Vulcans: i.e., fire’s; see above, 5.4n. 5 scumd the drosse: skimmed off the waste. Cf. Milton, Paradise Lost, 1.704 (“scumm’d the Bullion dross”) and the 2

whole of the passage (1.670–709) describing Mammon’s infernal foundry. 6 fervent: glowing. 7 retyre: turn back. 8 9

That: that which. withstood: refused.

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39

“Suffise it then, thou Money God” (quoth hee) “That all thine ydle offers I refuse. All that I need I have; what needeth mee To covet more, then I have cause to use? With such vaine shewes thy worldlinges vyle abuse: But give me leave to follow mine emprise.” Mammon was much displeasd, yet no’te he chuse, But beare the rigour of his bold mesprise,1 And thence him forward ledd, him further to entise.

40

He brought him through a darksom narrow strayt,2 To a broad gate, all built of beaten gold: The gate was open, but therein did wayt A sturdie villein,3 stryding stiffe and bold, As if that highest God defy he would; In his right hand an yron club he held, And he himselfe was all of yron mould,4 Yet had both life and sence, and well could weld5 That cursed weapon, when his cruell foes he queld.6

41

Disdayne he called was, and did disdayne To be so cald, and who so did him call: Sterne was his looke, and full of stomacke7 vayne, His portaunce terrible, and stature tall, Far passing th’hight of men terrestriall; Like an huge Gyant of the Titans 8 race, That made him scorne all creatures great and small, And with his pride all others powre deface:9 More fitt emongst black fiendes, then men to have his place.

42

Soone as those glitterand10 armes he did espye, That with their brightnesse made that darknes light, His harmefull club he gan to hurtle11 hye, And threaten batteill to the Faery knight; Who likewise gan himselfe to batteill dight,

1

mesprise: scorn. strayt: passage. 3 villein: villain, servant. 4 mould: composition, construction. 5 weld: wield. 6 queld: killed. 7 stomacke: pride, spite. 2

8

The Titans were the giant race of immortals who preceded the gods of classical mythology.

9

deface: abash, discountenance. glitterand: glittering. 11 hurtle: raise, wave. 10

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Till Mammon did his hasty hand withhold, And counseld him abstaine from perilous fight: For nothing might abash the villein bold, Ne mortall steele emperce his miscreated mould.1 43

So having him with reason pacifyde, And the fiers Carle2 commaunding to forbeare, He brought him in. The rowme was large and wyde, As it some Gyeld3 or solemne Temple weare: Many great golden pillours did upbeare The massy4 roofe, and riches huge sustayne, And every pillour decked was full deare5 With crownes and Diademes, and titles6 vaine, Which mortall Princes wore, whiles they on earth did rayne.

44

A route7 of people there assembled were, Of every sort and nation under skye, Which with great uprore preaced8 to draw nere To th’upper part, where was advaunced hye A stately siege9 of soveraine majestye, And thereon satt a woman gorgeous gay,10 And richly cladd in robes of royaltye, That never earthly Prince in such aray His glory did enhaunce and pompous pryde display.

45

Her face right wondrous faire did seeme to bee, That her broad beauties beam great brightnes threw Through the dim shade, that all men might it see: Yet was not that same her owne native hew, But wrought by art and counterfetted shew, Thereby more lovers unto her to call; Nath’lesse most hevenly faire in deed and vew She by creation was, till she did fall,11 Thenceforth she sought for helps to cloke her crime withall.

1 miscreated mould: unnatural body (because it is moulded or created out of iron). 2 Carle: churl, a synonym of “villein” (above, 40.4). 3 Gyeld: guildhall. 4 massy: weighty. 5 full deare: in very costly fashion. 6 titles: emblems of rank.

7

route: throng. preaced: pressed, crowded. 9 siege: seat, throne. 10 gorgeous gay: brilliantly arrayed. 8

11

The diction recalls Satan, who until his fall from heaven was Lucifer, the fairest of the angels.

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46

There as in glistring glory she did sitt, She held a great gold chaine ylincked well,1 Whose upper end to highest heven was knitt,2 And lower part did reach to lowest Hell, And all that preace3 did rownd about her swell, To catchen hold of that long chaine, thereby To climbe aloft, and others to excell: That was Ambition, rash desire to sty,4 And every linck thereof a step of dignity.

47

Some thought to raise themselves to high degree, By riches and unrighteous reward, Some by close shouldring,5 some by flatteree; Others through friends, others for base regard;6 And all by wrong waies for themselves prepard. Those that were up themselves, kept others low, Those that were low themselves, held others hard, Ne suffred them to ryse or greater grow, But every one did strive his fellow downe to throw.

48

Which whenas Guyon saw, he gan inquire, What meant that preace about that Ladies throne, And what she was that did so high aspyre. Him Mammon answered, “That goodly one, Whom all that folke with such contention, Doe flock about, my deare my daughter is, Honour and dignitie from her alone, Derived are, and all this worldes blis For which ye men doe strive; few gett, but many mis.

49

“And fayre Philotime7 she rightly hight, The fairest wight that wonneth under skye, But that8 this darksom neather world her light

1

The image of a golden chain binding heaven and earth has a long history, deriving ultimately from Homer, Iliad, 8.19–26; it came to represent the linking and gradation of all things. 2 knitt: attached. 3 preace: throng.

4

sty: ascend; the phrase is a definition of “Ambition.” 5 close shouldring: shoving in closer, secretly pushing aside. 6

regard: reward, i.e., bribes. Philotime: Greek for “love of honor,” in the sense of rank or dignity. 8 But that: and except that. 7

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Doth dim with horror and deformity, Worthie of heven and hye felicitie, From whence the gods have her for envy thrust: But sith thou hast found favour in mine eye, Thy spouse I will her make, if that thou lust,1 That she may thee advance for works and merits just.” 50

“Gramercy2 Mammon” (said the gentle knight) “For so great grace and offred high estate, But I, that am fraile flesh and earthly wight, Unworthy match for such immortall mate, My selfe well wote, and mine unequall fate,3 And were I not, yet is my trouth yplight,4 And love avowd to other Lady late,5 That to remove the same I have no might: To chaunge love causelesse is reproch to warlike knight.”

51

Mammon emmoved was with inward wrath; Yet forcing it to fayne, him forth thence ledd Through griesly shadowes by a beaten path, Into a gardin goodly garnished With hearbs and fruits, whose kinds mote not be redd.6 Not such, as earth out of her fruitfull woomb Throwes forth to men sweet and well savored,7 But direfull deadly black both leafe and bloom, Fitt to adorne the dead and deck the drery toombe.

52

There mournfull Cypresse grew in greatest store, And trees of bitter Gall, and Heben sad, Dead sleeping Poppy, and black Hellebore, Cold Coloquintida, and Tetra mad, Mortall Samnitis, and Cicuta bad,8

1

6

2

7

lust: desire. Gramercy: thank you. 3 I.e., and know (“wote”) my lot unequal (to hers). 4 yplight: pledged. 5 late: lately. The “other Lady” is presumably the Faerie Queen herself, whom Guyon has sworn to serve and whose image he bears on his shield.

redd: known. well savored: good-tasting. 8 All these plants are associated with death. On the cypress, see i.60.3n.; gall is the bitter fruit of a type of oak; “Heben” means either ebony (as at viii.17.6), which is black, or hebenon, which is a poison (as in Shakespeare, Hamlet, 1.5.62); poppy is the source of various narcotics; “Hellebore” and “Coloquintida” are poisons, as is “Tetra,”

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Which with th’unjust Atheniens made to dy Wise Socrates, who thereof quaffing glad Pourd out his life, and last Philosophy To the fayre Critias his dearest Belamy.1 53

The Gardin of Proserpina2 this hight; And in the midst thereof a silver seat, With a thick Arber goodly overdight,3 In which she often usd from open heat Her selfe to shroud, and pleasures to entreat.4 Next thereunto did grow a goodly tree, With braunches broad dispredd and body great. Clothed with leaves, that none the wood mote see And loaden all with fruit as thick as it might bee.

54

Their fruit were golden apples glistring bright, That goodly was their glory to behold, On earth like never grew, ne living wight Like ever saw, but they from hence were sold;5 For those, which Hercules with conquest bold Got from great Atlas daughters,6 hence began, And planted there, did bring forth fruit of gold: And those, with which th’Eubaean young man wan Swift Atalanta, when through craft he her out ran.7

also known as deadly nightshade. “Samnitis” is not known outside of this instance. “Cicuta” is hemlock, the poison drunk by Socrates when he was condemned to death by the Athenians in 399 BC, as the following lines recount. These plants are helpfully identified by both Kitchin and Hamilton. 1 Belamy: good friend (French bel ami). Since Critias was, in fact, an enemy of Socrates, either Spenser is being ironic, or more likely he has made a mistake. In Plato’s dialogue Crito, Socrates awaiting death expounds his “last Philosophy” to his friend and student Crito, and Spenser may have confused the names; or he may have misread a passage about Critias in Cicero, Tusculan Disputations, 1.40. 2 Proserpina: wife of Hades, queen of the underworld. She is particularly relevant

here because she was condemned to stay in the underworld after eating some of its fruit. The garden with its tempting fruit also recalls the Garden of Eden in Genesis, chapters 2–3. 3 overdight: covered, shaded. 4 entreat: ask for, enjoy. 5 sold: taken. 6 As one of his twelve labors, Hercules stole golden apples from a tree that was guarded by a dragon and by the Hesperides, daughters of Atlas. 7 Hippomenes, from Euboea, defeated Atalanta in a footrace by dropping golden apples in her path; as a prize, he was allowed to marry her. See Ovid, Metamorphoses, 10.644–80.

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55

Here also sprong that goodly golden fruit, With which Acontius got his lover trew,1 Whom he had long time sought with fruitlesse suit: Here eke that famous golden Apple grew, The which emongest the Gods false Ate threw: For which th’Idaean Ladies disagreed, Till partiall Paris dempt2 it Venus dew, And had of her, fayre Helen for his meed, That many noble Greekes and Trojans made to bleed.3

56

The warlike Elfe, much wondred at this tree, So fayre and great, that shadowed all the ground, And his broad braunches, laden with rich fee,4 Did stretch themselves without the utmost bound Of this great gardin, compast5 with a mound, Which over-hanging, they themselves did steepe, In a blacke flood which flow’d about it round, That is the river of Cocytus 6 deepe, In which full many soules do endlesse wayle and weepe.

57

Which to behold, he clomb up to the bancke, And looking downe, saw many damned wightes, In those sad waves, which direfull deadly stancke, Plonged continually of cruell Sprightes, That with their piteous cryes, and yelling shrightes,7 They made the further shore resounden wide: Emongst the rest of those same ruefull8 sightes, One cursed creature, he by chaunce espide, That drenched9 lay full deepe, under the Garden side.

1

According to Ovid, Acontius got his beloved Cydippe to marry him by tricking her into reading aloud a marriage vow written on an apple (Heroides, 20). 2 dempt: deemed. 3 At the marriage feast of the goddess Thetis, Ate, goddess of discord, threw a golden apple among the guests inscribed “To the fairest.” Juno, Minerva, and Venus argued over which of them deserved it and went to be judged by Paris on Mount Ida. He awarded it to Venus, who as a reward

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(“meed”) promised him Helen, wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta; this then caused the Trojan War. 4 fee: treasure. 5 compast: encircled. 6 Cocytus: river of lamentation, one of the four rivers of the underworld. 7

shrightes: shrieks. ruefull: pitiful. 9 drenched: submerged. 8

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58

Deepe was he drenched to the upmost chin,1 Yet gaped still as coveting to drinke, Of the cold liquour which he waded in, And stretching forth his hand, did often thinke To reach the fruit which grew upon the brincke: But both the fruit from hand, and flood from mouth Did fly abacke, and made him vainely swincke: The whiles he sterv’d with hunger, and with drouth2 He daily dyde, yet never throughly dyen couth.3

59

The knight him seeing labour so in vaine, Askt who he was, and what he ment thereby: Who groning deepe, thus answerd him againe;4 “Most cursed of all creatures under skye, Lo Tantalus,5 I here tormented lye: Of whom high Jove wont whylome feasted bee, Lo here I now for want of food doe dye: But if that thou be such, as I thee see, Of grace I pray thee, give to eat and drinke to mee.”

60

“Nay, nay, thou greedy Tantalus” (quoth he) “Abide6 the fortune of thy present fate, And unto all that live in high degree, Ensample be of mind more temperate, To teach them how to use their present state.” Then gan the cursed wretch alowd to cry, Accusing highest Jove and gods ingrate,7 And eke blaspheming heaven bitterly, As authour of unjustice, there to let him dye.8

1 2 3

I.e., up to the bottom of his chin. sterv’d: starved, died; drouth: thirst.

couth: could. againe: in return. 5 Tantalus used to host the gods (as he mentions in the next line), but at one feast he served up his own son Pelops in a dish; his punishment described here derives from Homer, Odyssey, 11.582–92. Guyon’s ques4

tioning of and response to him are reminiscent of Dante’s Inferno, esp. 8.31–39. 6 Abide: endure. 7 ingrate: unfriendly, or ungrateful (since they used to be his guests). 8 Tantalus calls the gods unjust because they permit him to die endlessly, or because they prevent (“let”) him from dying (58.9, above); or else he calls upon them to let him truly die once and for all.

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61

He lookt a litle further, and espyde Another wretch, whose carcas deepe was drent Within the river, which the same did hyde: But both his handes most filthy feculent,1 Above the water were on high extent,2 And faynd3 to wash themselves incessantly, Yet nothing cleaner were for such intent, But rather fowler seemed to the eye, So lost his labour vaine and ydle industry.4

62

The knight him calling, asked who he was, Who lifting up his head, him answerd thus: “I Pilate5 am the falsest Judge, alas, And most unjust that by unrighteous And wicked doome to Jewes despiteous,6 Delivered up the Lord of life to dye, And did acquite a murdrer felonous, The whiles my handes I washt in purity, The whiles my soule was soyld with fowle iniquity.”

63

Infinite moe,7 tormented in like paine He there beheld, too long here to be told: Ne Mammon would there let him long remayne, For terrour of the tortures manifold, In which the damned soules he did behold, But roughly him bespake. “Thou fearefull foole Why takest not of that same fruite of gold, Ne sittest downe on that same silver stoole,8 To rest thy weary person, in the shadow coole.”

1

feculent: befouled; literally “covered with feces.” 2 extent: extended. 3 faynd: pretended, wished. 4 industry: effort. 5 Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor of Judea, turned Jesus over to be executed, though he knew him to be innocent, and released Barabbas, a “murdrer felonous.” As he did so he ritually washed his hands of the matter; see Matt. 27.24–26. It is not clear why Pilate belongs in the cave of Mam-

117

mon, since his sin does not seem to have been one of excess, although some medieval commentaries accused him of ambition or of misuse of public funds. His dirty hands are the counterpart of Ruddymane’s equally unwashable but innocent hands (ii.3–4). 6

doome: judgment; despiteous: hateful, pitiless. 7 moe: more. 8 The seat of Proserpina (53.2, above).

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64

All which he did, to do him deadly fall, In frayle intemperaunce through sinfull bayt, To which if he inclined had at all, That dreadfull feend, which did behinde him wayt, Would him have rent in thousand peeces strayt:1 But he was wary wise in all his way, And well perceived his deceiptfull sleight, Ne suffred lust his safety to betray; So goodly did beguile the Guyler2 of his pray.

65

And now he has so long remained theare, That vitall3 powres gan wexe both weake and wan, For want of food, and sleepe, which two upbeare, Like mightie pillours, this frayle life of man, That none without the same enduren can. For now three dayes of men were full outwrought,4 Since he this hardy enterprize began: For thy5 great Mammon fayrely he besought, Into the world to guyde him backe, as he him brought.

66

The God, though loth, yet was constraynd t’obay, For lenger time, then that, no living wight Below the earth, might suffred to be to stay: So backe againe, him brought to living light. But all so soone as his enfeebled spright, Gan sucke this vitall ayre into his brest, As overcome with too exceeding might, The life did flit away out of her nest, And all his sences were with deadly fit opprest.6

1

strayt: immediately. Guyler: beguiler, deceiver. 3 vitall: of life, life-giving (as again below, 66.6). 4 outwrought: completed; on the three days see xii.2.4n. 5 For thy: therefore. 6 Guyon’s fainting has occasioned much debate. It may serve as a reminder of his phys2

ical limitations––Guyon is only human after all. Or it may reflect upon him morally; some critics have suggested that Guyon was overconfident or overly curious in choosing to enter Mammon’s cave rather than pursue his quest. Either way, the swoon reveals the hero’s need for the aid of heavenly grace, which comes in the form first of the guardian angel and then of Arthur.

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Canto Eight Sir Guyon layd in swowne1 is by Acrates sonnes despoyld,2 Whom Arthure3 soone hath reskewed And Paynim4 brethren foyld.

1

And is there care in heaven? and is their love In heavenly spirits to these creatures bace, That may compassion of their evilles5 move? There is: else much more wretched were the cace Of men then beasts. But O th’exceeding grace Of highest God, that loves his creatures so, And all his workes with mercy doth embrace, That blessed Angels, he sends to and fro, To serve to wicked man, to serve his wicked foe.

2

1

How oft do they, their silver bowers leave, To come to succour us, that succour want,6 How oft do they with golden pineons,7 cleave The flitting skyes, like flying Pursuivant,8 Against fowle feendes to ayd us militant: They for us fight, they watch and dewly ward,9 And their bright Squadrons round about us plant, And all for love, and nothing for reward: O why should hevenly God to men have such regard?10

swowne: swoon. despoyld: stripped of armor. “Acrates sonnes” are Pyrochles and Cymochles, as explained at iv.41. 3 Arthur appears in every book of The Faerie Queene, coming to the rescue when one of the knights is in trouble. He is a British prince (we learn his whole ancestry in Canto Ten); in Book One, he relates how he had a vision of the Faerie Queen and is now traveling through Faerie Land in search of her (I.ix.13–15). 4 Paynim: pagan; applied generally to evil characters in romance literature. 2

5 evilles: sufferings. Spenser reverses Virgil’s question, whether heavenly spirits are vindictive (Aeneid, 1.11). 6 want: lack, need, wish for. 7 pineons: wings. 8 flitting: shifting; Pursuivant: royal officer empowered to make arrests. 9

dewly ward: keep necessary guard. A paraphrase of Ps. 8.4 and 144.3, and of Job 7.17. The biblical language is apt: these two famous stanzas and the subsequent appearance of the angel mark “the only moment in the poem when God intervenes directly into the narrative” (Hamilton).

10

119

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3

During the while, that Guyon did abide In Mamons house, the Palmer, whom whyleare That wanton Mayd of passage had denide,1 By further search had passage found elsewhere, And being on his way, approched neare, Where Guyon lay in traunce, when suddeinly He heard a voyce, that called lowd and cleare, “Come hether, come hether, O come hastily”; That all the fields resounded with the ruefull cry.

4

The Palmer lent his eare unto the noyce, To weet, who called so importunely:2 Againe he heard a more efforced3 voyce, That bad him come in haste. He by and by4 His feeble feet directed to the cry; Which to that shady delve5 him brought at last, Where Mammon earst did sunne his threasury: There the good Guyon he found slumbring fast In senceles dreame; which sight at first him sore aghast.

5

Beside his head there satt a faire young man, Of wondrous beauty, and of freshest yeares, Whose tender bud to blossome new began, And florish faire above his equall peares;6 His snowy front7 curled with golden heares, Like Phoebus8 face adornd with sunny rayes, Divinely shone, and two sharpe winged sheares,9 Decked with diverse plumes, like painted Jayes,10 Were fixed at his backe, to cut his ayery wayes.

6

Like as Cupido on Idaean hill,11 When having laid his cruell bow away, And mortall arrowes, wherewith he doth fill

1

Phaedria, the “wanton Mayd,” had refused to give the Palmer passage in her boat at vi.19. 2 importunely: insistently. 3 efforced: uttered with effort. 4 by and by: immediately. 5 delve: hollow, pit; as at vii.Arg.1. 6 equall peares: companions of the same age.

7

front: brow. Phoebus: god of the sun. 9 sheares: i.e., wings, like shears in that they cleave the air (line 9). 8

10

Jayes: brightly colored birds. Cupid is pictured on Mount Ida as the site of his mother Venus’ victory as well as the beginning of one of his “murdrous” and bloody wars; see vii.55.9n.

11

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The world with murdrous spoiles and bloody pray, With his faire mother he him dights to play, And with his goodly sisters, Graces three;1 The Goddesse pleased with his wanton play, Suffers her selfe through sleepe beguild to bee,2 The whiles the other Ladies mind theyr mery glee.3 7

Whom when the Palmer saw, abasht he was Through fear and wonder, that he nought could say, Till him the childe4 bespoke, “Long lackt, alas, Hath bene thy faithfull aide in hard assay, Whiles deadly fitt thy pupill doth dismay; Behold this heavy sight, thou reverend Sire, But dread of death and dolor doe away; For life ere long shall to her home retire,5 And he that breathlesse seems, shal corage bold respire.6

8

“The charge, which God doth unto me arrett,7 Of his deare safety, I to thee commend;8 Yet will I not forgoe, ne yet forgett The care thereof my selfe unto the end, But evermore him succour, and defend Against his foe and mine: watch thou I pray; For evill is at hand him to offend.”9 So having said, eftsoones he gan display His painted nimble wings, and vanisht quite away.

9

The Palmer seeing his lefte empty place, And his slow eies beguiled of their sight, Woxe sore affraid, and standing still a space, Gaz’d after him, as fowle10 escapt by flight; At last him turning to his charge behight,11 With trembling hand his troubled pulse gan try,

1

The three Graces were handmaids of Venus; only in later tradition are they sisters of Cupid. They appear in the poem at VI.x.12. 2 I.e., to be lulled to sleep. 3 glee: play, music. 4 childe: youth, specifically one of noble birth.

5

retire: return. respire: breathe again. 7 arrett: assign. 8 commend: commit. 9 offend: harm. 10 fowle: bird. 11 behight: commanded. 6

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Where finding life not yet dislodged quight, He much rejoyst, and covrd1 it tenderly, As chicken newly hatcht, from dreaded destiny. 10

At last he spide, where towards him did pace Two Paynim2 knights, al armd as bright as skie, And them beside an aged Sire did trace,3 And far before a light-foote Page did flie, That breathed strife and troublous enmitie; Those were the two sonnes of Acrates old, Who meeting earst with Archimago slie, Foreby that idle strond,4 of him were told, That he, which earst them combatted, was Guyon bold.

11

Which to avenge on him they dearly vowd, Where ever that on ground they mote him find; False Archimage provokte their corage prowd, And stryful Atin in their stubborne mind Coles of contention and whot vengeaunce tind.5 Now bene they come, whereas the Palmer sate, Keeping that slombred corse6 to him assind; Well knew they both his person, sith of late With him in bloody armes they rashly did debate.7

12

Whom when Pyrochles saw, inflam’d with rage, That sire he fowl bespake, “Thou dotard vile, That with thy brutenesse shendst thy comely8 age, Abandon soone,9 I read, the caytive spoile Of that same outcast carcas, that ere while Made it selfe famous through false trechery, And crownd his coward crest with knightly stile;10 Loe where he now inglorious doth lye, To prove he lived il, that did thus fowly dye.”

1

6

2

7

covrd: covered, protected. Paynim: see above, Arg.4 and n. 3 trace: walk, track (like a hound). 4 Archimago joined Pyrochles by the Idle Lake (“that idle strond”) at vi.47. 5 tind: kindled.

slombred corse: sleeping body. debate: fight. 8 brutenesse: foolishness; comely: decorous. 9 soone: immediately. 10 stile: title, manner.

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13

To whom the Palmer fearlesse answered, “Certes, Sir knight, ye bene too much to blame, Thus for to blott the honor of the dead, And with fowle cowardize his carcas shame, Whose living handes immortalizd his name, Vile is the vengeaunce on the ashes cold, And envy base, to barke at sleeping fame:1 Was never wight, that treason of him told; Your self his prowesse prov’d and found him fiers and bold.”

14

Then sayd Cymochles, “Palmer, thou doest dote, Ne canst of prowesse, ne of knighthood deeme,2 Save as thou seest or hearst. But well I wote, That of his puissaunce tryall made extreeme; Yet gold al is not, that doth golden seeme, Ne all good knights, that shake3 well speare and shield: The worth of all men by their end esteeme; And then dew praise, or dew reproch them yield; Bad therefore I him deeme, that thus lies dead on field.”

15

“Good or bad,” gan his brother fiers reply, “What doe I recke, sith that he dide entire?4 Or what doth his bad death now satisfy, The greedy hunger of revenging yre, Sith wrathfull hand wrought not her owne desire? Yet since no way is lefte to wreake my spight, I will him reave of armes, the victors hire,5 And of that shield, more worthy of good knight; For why should a dead dog be deckt in armour bright?”

16

“Fayr Sir,” said then the Palmer suppliaunt,6 “For knighthoods love, doe not so fowle a deed, Ne blame7 your honor with so shamefull vaunt Of vile revenge. To spoile the dead of weed8

1

I.e., to impugn the reputation of one who cannot respond. 2 deeme: judge. 3 shake: brandish. 4 recke: care; entire: uninjured, wholly (in either case depriving Pyrochles of his revenge).

5

reave: strip; hire: reward. suppliaunt: in entreaty. 7 blame: besmirch. 8 weed: clothing. 6

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Is sacrilege, and doth all sinnes exceed; But leave these relicks of his living might, To decke his herce, and trap his tomblacke1 steed.” “What herce or steed” (said he) “should he have dight, But be entombed in the raven or the kight?”2 17

With that, rude hand upon his shield he laid, And th’other brother gan his helme unlace,3 Both fiercely bent to have him disaraid; Till that they spyde, where towards them did pace An armed knight, of bold and bounteous grace, Whose squire bore after him an heben4 launce, And coverd shield.5 Well kend him so far space Th’enchaunter by his armes and amenaunce,6 When under him he saw his Lybian7 steed to praunce.

18

And to those brethren sayd, “Rise rise bylive,8 And unto batteil doe your selves addresse; For yonder comes the prowest9 knight alive, Prince Arthur, flowre of grace and nobilesse, That hath to Paynim knights wrought gret distresse, And thousand Sar’zins10 fowly donne to dye.” That word so deepe did in their harts impresse, That both eftsoones upstarted furiously, And gan themselves prepare to batteill greedily.

19

But fiers Pyrrhochles, lacking his owne sword, The want thereof now greatly gan to plaine, And Archimage besought, him that afford,11 Which he had brought for Braggadochio vaine. “So would I” (said th’enchaunter) “glad and faine

1 trap: adorn; tomblacke: explained by the 1596 spelling, “tomb-blacke.” 2 kight: kite, a predatory bird. 3 his helme unlace: unfasten his helmet. 4 5

heben: ebony.

At I.viii.19 we learn that Arthur’s shield is kept covered because it is blindingly bright, a detail Spenser derives from Ariosto, Orlando Furioso, 2.55–56.

6 amenaunce: bearing (and perhaps ability to “amenage” a horse, as in the next line). 7 Lybian: Arabian (Hamilton). 8 bylive: immediately. 9 prowest: most valiant. 10

Sar’zins: Saracens (i.e., Muslims, but generally used, like “Paynim,” to refer to any wicked knight). 11 afford: lend.

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Beteeme1 to you this sword, you to defend, Or ought that els your honor might maintaine, But that this weapons powre I well have kend, To be contrary to the worke, which ye intend. 20

“For that same knights owne sword this is of yore, Which Merlin2 made by his almightie art, For that his noursling, when he knighthood swore, Therewith to doen his foes eternall smart. The metall first he mixt with Medaewart,3 That no enchauntment from his dint4 might save; Then it in flames of Aetna5 wrought apart, And seven times dipped in the bitter wave Of hellish Styx, which hidden vertue to it gave.6

21

“The vertue is, that nether steele, nor stone The stroke thereof from entraunce may defend; Ne ever may be used by his fone,7 Ne forst his rightful owner to offend, Ne ever will it breake, ne ever bend. Wherefore Morddure8 it rightfully is hight. In vaine therefore, Pyrhochles, should I lend The same to thee, against his lord to fight, For sure yt would deceive9 thy labor, and thy might.”

22

“Foolish old man,” said then the Pagan wroth, “That weenest words or charms may force withstond: Soone shalt thou see, and then beleeve for troth, That I can carve with this inchaunted brond10

1

Beteeme: grant. Merlin: the wizard who tutored Arthur (his pupil or “noursling”). His crafting of the sword is described at I.vii.36. 3 Medaewart: meadwort, a plant also known as meadow-sweet. 4 his dint: its stroke. 5 Aetna: volcano in Sicily, traditionally the site of Vulcan’s forge. 6 Achilles was similarly dipped in the river Styx, which rendered him invulnerable (except at the heel where he was held when 2

dipped); cf. also Turnus’ sword in Virgil, Aeneid, 12.90–91. Hamilton compares the biblical Naaman, who dipped himself seven times in the Jordan to be cleansed (2 Kings 5.10). 7 fone: foes. 8 Morddure: French mordre, “to bite,” plus dur, “hard”; with threatening overtones of death (French mort) and “murder.” 9

deceive: betray, nullify. brond: sword.

10

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His Lords owne flesh.” Therewith out of his hond That vertuous1 steele he rudely snatcht away, And Guyons shield about his wrest he bond; So ready dight, fierce battaile to assay, And match his brother proud in battailous aray. 23

By this that straunger knight in presence came, And goodly salued them; who nought againe2 Him answered, as courtesie became, But with sterne lookes, and stomachous3 disdaine, Gave signes of grudge and discontentment vaine: Then turning to the Palmer, he gan spy Where at his feet, with sorrowfull demayne4 And deadly hew, an armed corse did lye, In whose dead face he redd great magnanimity.

24

Sayd he then to the Palmer, “Reverend syre, What great misfortune hath betidd this knight? Or did his life her fatall date expyre,5 Or did he fall by treason, or by fight? How ever, sure I rew his piteous plight.” “Not one, nor other,” sayd the Palmer grave, “Hath him befalne, but cloudes of deadly night A while his heavy eylids cover’d have, And all his sences drowned in deep sencelesse wave.

25

“Which those his cruell foes, that stand hereby, Making advauntage, to revenge their spight, Would him disarme, and treaten shamefully, Unworthie usage of redoubted knight. But you, faire Sir, whose honourable sight6 Doth promise hope of helpe, and timely grace, Mote I beseech to succour his sad plight, And by your powre protect his feeble cace.7 First prayse of knighthood is, fowle outrage to deface.”8

1

vertuous: powerful, beneficent. salued: greeted; againe: in return. 3 stomachous: proud, angry. 4 demayne: demeanor, appearance. 2

5

her fatall date expyre: complete its fated term. 6 sight: appearance. 7 cace: state. 8 deface: erase, outface, put down.

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“Palmer,” (said he) “no knight so rude, I weene, As to doen outrage to a sleeping ghost:1 Ne was there ever noble corage seene, That in advauntage would his puissaunce bost:2 Honour is least, where oddes appeareth most. May bee, that better reason will aswage, The rash revengers heat. Words well dispost3 Have secrete powre, t’appease inflamed rage: If not, leave unto me thy knights last patronage.”4

27

Tho turning to those brethren, thus bespoke, “Ye warlike payre, whose valorous great might It seemes, just wronges to vengeaunce doe provoke, To wreake your wrath on this dead seeming knight, Mote ought allay the storme of your despight, And settle patience in so furious heat? Not to debate the chalenge5 of your right, But for this carkas pardon I entreat, Whom fortune hath already laid in lowest seat.”6

28

To whom Cymochles said, “For what art thou, That mak’st thy selfe his dayes-man, to prolong7 The vengeaunce prest? Or who shall let8 me now, On this vile body from to wreak my wrong, And make his carkas as the outcast dong?9 Why should not the dead carrion satisfye The guilt, which if he lived had thus long, His life for dew revenge should deare abye?10 The trespas still doth live, albee the person dye.”

29

“Indeed,” then said the Prince, “the evill donne Dyes not, when breath the body first doth leave, But from the grandsyre to the Nephewes11 sonne,

1

8

2

9

ghost: spirit. I.e., that, having an advantage, would vaunt his strength. 3 dispost: ordered, meant. 4 last patronage: ultimate defense. 5 chalenge: claim. 6 seat: condition. 7 dayes-man: mediator; prolong: delay.

127

prest: at hand, demanded; let: prevent. dong: dung, refuse. 10 abye: pay for. 11

Nephewe: grandson (Latin nepos). Cf. Ex. 20.5 (the second commandment): “I am the Lord thy God, a jelouse God, visiting the iniquitie of the fathers upon the children, upon the third generacion and upon the fourth of them that hate me.”

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And all his seede the curse doth often cleave, Till vengeaunce utterly the guilt bereave:1 So streightly2 God doth judge. But gentle knight, That doth against the dead his hand upreare,3 His honour staines with rancour and despight, And great disparagment makes to his former might.” 30

Pyrrhochles gan reply the second tyme, And to him said, “Now felon sure I read,4 How that thou art partaker of his cryme: Therefore by Termagaunt5 thou shalt be dead.” With that his hand, more sad6 then lomp of lead, Uplifting high, he weened with Morddure, His owne good sword Morddure, to cleave his head. The faithfull steele such treason no’uld endure, But swarving from the marke, his Lordes life did assure.7

31

Yet was the force so furious and so fell, That horse and man it made to reele asyde; Nath’lesse the Prince would not forsake his sell: For well of yore he learned had to ryde, But full of anger fiersly to him cryde; “False traitour miscreaunt,8 thou broken hast The law of armes, to strike foe undefide.9 But thou thy treasons fruit, I hope, shalt taste Right sowre, and feele the law, the which thou hast defast.”10

32

With that his balefull speare, he fiercely bent Against the Pagans brest, and therewith thought His cursed life out of her lodg have rent: But ere the point arrived, where it ought, That seven fold shield, which he from Guyon brought11

1

bereave: expiate. streightly: strictly. 3 On the lack of rhyme, see ii.7.7n. 2

4

read: discern. Termagaunt: a word of obscure origin, used by medieval writers as the name of a supposed Muslim deity. Like Cymochles’ exclamation “By Mahoune” (i.e., Mohammed) at 33.3 below, this oath marks Pyrochles as a Saracen (see above, 18.6n.).

5

6

sad: heavy. assure: preserve. 8 miscreaunt: infidel. 9 undefide: without a verbal challenge; see v.3.7n. 10 sowre: sour; defast: shamed, defied. 11 brought: took; on the “seven fold” shield, see v.6.3n. 7

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He cast between to ward the bitter stownd:1 Through all those foldes the steelehead passage wrought And through his shoulder perst; wherwith to ground He groveling2 fell, all gored in his gushing wound. 33

Which when his brother saw, fraught with great griefe And wrath, he to him leaped furiously, And fowly saide, “By Mahoune,3 cursed thiefe, That direfull stroke thou dearely shalt aby.”4 Then hurling5 up his harmefull blade on hy, Smote him so hugely on his haughtie crest, That from his saddle forced him to fly: Els mote it needes downe to his manly brest Have cleft his head in twaine, and life thence dispossest.

34

Now was the Prince in daungerous distresse, Wanting his sword, when he on foot should6 fight: His single speare could doe him small redresse,7 Against two foes of so exceeding might, The least of which was match for any knight. And now the other, whom he earst did daunt, Had reard him selfe againe to cruel fight, Three times more furious and more puissaunt, Unmindfull of his wound, of his fate ignoraunt.8

35

So both attonce him charge on either syde, With hideous strokes, and importable9 powre, That forced him his ground to traverse10 wyde, And wisely watch to ward that deadly stowre: For in his shield, as thicke as stormie showre, Their strokes did raine, yet did he never quaile, Ne backward shrinke, but as a stedfast towre, Whom foe with double battry doth assaile, Them on her bulwarke beares, and bids11 them nought availe.

1

stownd: shock. groveling: prostrate. 3 See above, 30.4n. 4 aby: pay for. 5 hurling: lifting. 6 should: must. 2

7 I.e., his spear alone could give him little assistance. 8 ignoraunt: careless, unaware. 9 importable: unbearable. 10 traverse: shift, dodge. 11 bids: causes.

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So stoutly he withstood their strong assay, Till that at last, when he advantage spyde, His poynant speare he thrust with puissant sway1 At proud Cymochles, whiles his shield was wyde,2 That through his thigh the mortall steele did gryde:3 He swarving with the force, within his flesh Did breake the launce, and let the head abyde:4 Out of the wound the redblood flowed fresh, That underneath his feet soone made a purple plesh.5

37

Horribly then he gan to rage, and rayle, Cursing his Gods, and him selfe damning deepe: Als when his brother saw the redblood rayle6 Adowne so fast and all his armour steepe,7 For very felnesse8 lowd he gan to weepe, And said, “Caytive, cursse on thy cruell hond, That twise hath spedd;9 yet shall it not thee keepe From the third brunt of this my fatall brond: Lo where the dreadfull Death behynd thy backe doth stond.”

38

With that he strooke, and thother strooke withall,10 That nothing seemd mote beare so monstrous might: The one upon his covered shield did fall, And glauncing downe would not his owner byte: But th’other did upon his troncheon11 smyte, Which hewing quite a sunder, further way It made, and on his hacqueton did lyte,12 The which dividing with importune sway,13 It seizd in his right side, and there the dint14 did stay.

1 2 3

poynant: piercing; sway: force. wyde: off to one side.

gryde: pierce. abyde: stay. 5 plesh: puddle. 6 rayle: gush. 7 steepe: wet. 8 felnesse: fury. 9 spedd: succeeded. 4

10

thother: the other, i.e., Cymochles; withall: as well. 11 troncheon: broken spear shaft (Hamilton), which Arthur continues to hold in his right hand. 12 hacqueton: protective jacket under the armor; lyte: land. 13 importune sway: impetuous force. 14 seizd: entered; dint: blow.

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39

Wyde was the wound, and a large lukewarme flood, Red as the Rose, thence gushed grievously, That when the Paynym spyde the streaming blood, Gave him great hart, and hope of victory. On thother side, in huge perplexity,1 The Prince now stood, having his weapon broke; Nought could he hurt, but still at warde did ly:2 Yet with his troncheon he so rudely stroke Cymochles twise, that twise him forst his foot revoke.3

40

Whom when the Palmer saw in such distresse, Sir Guyons sword he lightly to him raught, And said, “Fayre Sonne, great god thy right hand blesse, To use that sword so wisely as it ought.” Glad was the knight, and with fresh courage fraught,4 When as againe he armed felt his hond; Then like a Lyon, which hath long time saught His robbed whelpes5 and at the last them fond Emongst the shepeheard swaynes, then wexeth wood and yond.6

41

So fierce he laid about him, and dealt blowes On either side, that neither mayle could hold, Ne shield defend the thunder of his throwes:7 Now to Pyrrhochles many strokes he told;8 Eft to Cymochles twise so many fold: Then backe againe turning his busie hond, Them both atonce compeld with courage bold, To yield wide way to his hart-thrilling brond; And though they both stood stiffe, yet could not both withstond.

42

As salvage Bull, whom two fierce mastives bayt,9 When rancour doth with rage him once engore,10 Forgets with wary warde them to awayt,

1 2 3

perplexity: distress. at warde did ly: stood on his guard.

his foot revoke: step back. fraught: filled. 5 robbed whelpes: stolen cubs. Cf. Hosea 13.8: “I wil mete them, as a beare that is robbed of her whelpes . . . and there wil I devoure them like a lyon”; also 2 Sam. 17.8, Prov. 17.12. 4

6

swaynes: lads; yond: furious. throwes: blows. 8 told: counted, delivered. 9 mastives bayt: mastiffs (large dogs) attack or harass. Bull-baiting, like bear-baiting (see xi.33.3 and n.), was a popular entertainment. 10 engore: make bloody-minded. 7

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But with his dreadfull hornes them drives afore, Or flings aloft or treades downe in the flore, Breathing out wrath, and bellowing disdaine, That all the forest quakes to heare him rore: So rag’d Prince Arthur twixt his foemen twaine, That neither could his mightie puissaunce sustaine. 43

But ever at Pyrrhochles when he smitt, Who Guyons shield cast ever him before, Whereon the Faery Queenes pourtact was writt,1 His hand relented, and the stroke forbore, And his deare hart the picture gan adore, Which oft the Paynim sav’d from deadly stowre. But him henceforth the same can save no more; For now arrived is his fatall2 howre, That no’te avoyded be by earthly skill or powre.

44

For when Cymochles saw the fowle reproch, Which them appeached,3 prickt with guiltie shame, And inward griefe, he fiercely gan approch, Resolv’d to put away that loathly blame, Or dye with honour and desert of fame; And on the haubergh4 stroke the Prince so sore, That quite disparted all the linked frame, And pierced to the skin, but bit not thore,5 Yet made him twise to reele, that never moov’d afore.

45

Whereat renfierst6 with wrath and sharp regret, He stroke so hugely with his borrowd blade, That it empierst the Pagans burganet,7 And cleaving the hard steele, did deepe invade Into his head, and cruell passage made Quite through his brayne. He tombling downe on ground, Breathd out his ghost, which to th’infernall shade Fast flying, there eternall torment found, For all the sinnes, wherewith his lewd life did abound.

1

5

2

6

writt: painted; cf. i.28 and v.11. fatall: fated, of death. 3 appeached: accused, dishonored. 4 haubergh: coat of chain-mail (hence a “linked frame”); cf. the “haberieons” at vi.29.5.

thore: through. renfierst: rendered more fierce. 7 burganet: helmet.

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46

Which when his german1 saw, the stony feare, Ran to his hart, and all his sence dismayd, Ne thenceforth life ne corage did appeare, But as a man, whom hellish feendes have frayd,2 Long trembling still he stoode: at last thus sayd, “Traytour what hast thou doen? how ever may Thy cursed hand so cruelly have swayd3 Against that knight: harrow and well away,4 After so wicked deede why liv’st thou lenger day?”5

47

With that all desperate as loathing light, And with revenge desiring soone to dye, Assembling all his force and utmost might, With his owne sword he fierce at him did flye, And strooke, and foynd,6 and lasht outrageously, Withouten reason or regard. Well knew The Prince, with pacience and sufferaunce sly7 So hasty heat soone cooled to subdew: Tho when this breathlesse woxe, that8 batteil gan renew.

48

As when a windy tempest bloweth hye, That nothing may withstand his stormy stowre, The clowdes, as thinges affrayd, before him flye; But all so soone as his outrageous powre Is layd,9 they fiercely then begin to showre, And as in scorne of his spent stormy spight, Now all attonce their malice forth do poure; So did Prince Arthur beare himselfe in fight, And suffred rash Pyrrhochles waste his ydle might.

49

At last when as the Sarazin perceiv’d, How that straunge sword refusd, to serve his neede, But when he stroke most strong, the dint deceiv’d,10 He flong it from him, and devoyd of dreed,

1

6

2

7

german: brother. frayd: frightened. 3 swayd: struck. 4 Pyrochles echoes Atin’s exclamations of distress at vi.43.6. 5 lenger day: any longer.

foynd: thrust. sufferaunce sly: wise composure. 8 this . . . that: Pyrochles, Arthur. 9 layd: calmed. 10 Cf. 21.9, above.

133

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Upon him lightly leaping without heed, Twixt his two mighty armes engrasped fast, Thinking to overthrowe and downe him tred: But him in strength and skill the Prince surpast, And through his nimble sleight1 did under him down cast. 50

Nought booted it the Paynim then to strive; For as a Bittur2 in the Eagles clawe, That may not hope by flight to scape alive, Still waytes for death with dread and trembling aw, So now he subject to the victours law, Did not once move, nor upward cast his eye, For vile disdaine and rancour, which did gnaw His hart in twaine with sad melancholy,3 As one that loathed life, and yet despysd to dye.

51

But full of princely bounty and great mind,4 The Conquerour nought cared him to slay, But casting wronges and all revenge behind, More glory thought to give life, then decay, And sayd, “Paynim, this is thy dismall day;5 Yet if thou wilt renounce thy miscreaunce,6 And my trew liegeman7 yield thy selfe for ay, Life will I graunt thee for thy valiaunce, And all thy wronges will wipe out of my sovenaunce.”8

52

“Foole” (sayd the Pagan) “I thy gift defye, But use thy fortune, as it doth befall, And say, that I not overcome doe dye, But in despight of life, for death doe call.” Wroth was the Prince, and sory yet withall, That he so wilfully refused grace;9

1

sleight: skill, maneuver. Bittur: bittern, a marsh bird. 3 melancholy: anger, as well as grief. 4 great mind: magnanimity. In “The Letter to Raleigh” Spenser explains that Arthur embodies “magnificence,” which according to Aristotle is the highest virtue, 2

characterized by great and generous deeds, as here. 5 dismall day: day of doom; see vii.26.7n. 6 miscreaunce: false faith. 7 liegeman: vassal. 8 sovenaunce: memory. 9 grace: mercy, true religion.

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Yet sith his fate so cruelly did fall, His shining Helmet he gan soone unlace, And left his headlesse body bleeding1 all the place. 53

By this Sir Guyon from his traunce awakt, Life having maystered her sencelesse foe; And looking up, when as his shield he lakt,2 And sword saw not, he wexed wondrous woe:3 But when the Palmer, whom he long ygoe Had lost, he by him spyde, right glad he grew, And saide, “Deare sir, whom wandring to and fro I long have lackt, I joy thy face to vew; Firme is thy faith, whom daunger never fro me drew.

54

“But read, what wicked hand hath robbed mee Of my good sword and shield?” The Palmer glad, With so fresh hew uprising him to see, Him answered; “Fayre sonne, be no whit sad For want of weapons, they shall soone be had.” So gan he to discourse the whole debate,4 Which that straunge knight for him sustained had, And those two Sarazins confounded late, Whose carcases on ground were horribly prostrate.

55

Which when he heard, and saw the tokens trew, His hart with great affection was embayd,5 And to the Prince bowing reverence dew, As to the Patrone of his life, thus sayd; “My Lord, my liege,6 by whose most gratious ayd I live this day, and see my foes subdewd, What may suffise, to be for meede repayd Of so great graces, as ye have me shewd, But to be ever bound.”7

1

5

2

6

bleeding: bloodying. lakt: missed. 3 woe: woeful. 4 discourse: describe; debate: battle.

embayd: bathed, filled. liege: master. 7 On the incomplete line, see iii.26.9 and n.

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To whom the Infant1 thus, “Fayre Sir, what need Good turnes be counted, as a servile bond, To bind their dooers, to receive their meed?2 Are not all knightes by oath bound, to withstond Oppressours powre by armes and puissant hond? Suffise, that I have done my dew in place.”3 So goodly purpose they together fond,4 Of kindnesse and of courteous aggrace;5 The while false Archimage and Atin fled apace.

1

3

2

4

Infant: prince (Spanish infante). their meed: reward for them (the “Good turnes”).

dew in place: duty here. purpose: discourse; fond: made. 5 aggrace: grace, favor.

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Canto Nine The house of Temperance, in which doth sober Alma dwell, Besiegd of many foes, whom straunger knightes to flight compell.

1

Of all Gods workes, which doe this world adorne, There is no one more faire and excellent, Then is mans body both for powre and forme, Whiles it is kept in sober government; But none then it, more fowle and indecent, Distempred1 through misrule and passions bace: It growes a Monster, and incontinent Doth loose his dignity and native grace. Behold, who list, both one and other in this place.

2

After the Paynim brethren conquer’d were, The Briton Prince recov’ring his stolne sword, And Guyon his lost shield, they both yfere2 Forth passed on their way in fayre accord, Till him the Prince with gentle court did bord;3 “Sir knight, mote I of you this court’sy read,4 To weet why on your shield so goodly scord5 Beare ye the picture of that Ladies head? Full lively is the semblaunt,6 though the substance dead.”

3

“Fayre Sir” (sayd he) “if in that picture dead Such life ye read, and vertue7 in vaine shew, What mote ye weene, if the trew lively-head8 Of that most glorious visage ye did vew? But yf the beauty of her mind ye knew, That is her bounty, and imperiall powre,

1

Distempred: diseased, untuned. yfere: together. 3 court: courtesy; bord: address. 4 read: request. 5 scord: incised, scratched. 2

6 lively: lifelike; semblaunt: image, resemblance. 7 vertue: excellence, force. 8 lively-head: living original (Hamilton).

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Thousand times fairer then her mortal hew, O how great wonder would your thoughts devoure,1 And infinite desire into your spirite poure. 4

“Shee is the mighty Queene of Faery, Whose faire retraitt2 I in my shield doe beare; Shee is the flowre of grace and chastity, Throughout the world renowmed far and neare, My liefe, my liege, my Soveraine, my deare,3 Whose glory shineth as the morning starre, And with her light the earth enlumines4 cleare; Far reach her mercies, and her praises farre, As well in state of peace, as puissaunce in warre.”

5

“Thrise happy man,” (said then the Briton knight) “Whom gracious lott,5 and thy great valiaunce Have made thee soldier of that Princesse bright, Which with her bounty and glad countenaunce Doth blesse her servaunts, and them high advaunce. How may straunge6 knight hope ever to aspire, By faithfull service, and meete amenaunce,7 Unto such blisse? sufficient were that hire8 For losse of thousand lives, to die at her desire.”

6

Said Guyon, “Noble Lord, what meed so great, Or grace of earthly Prince so soveraine, But by your wondrous worth and warlike feat Ye well may hope, and easely attaine? But were your will, her sold to entertaine,9 And numbred be mongst knights of Maydenhed,10 Great guerdon, well I wote, should you remaine,11 And in her favor high bee reckoned, As Arthogall, and Sophy12 now beene honored.”

1

devoure: overwhelm. retraitt: portrait (Italian ritratto). 3 A chiasmus: “liefe” and “liege” are repeated in “deare” and “Soveraine” respectively.

7

2

8

4

11

enlumines: enlightens. 5 gracious lott: favorable chance. 6 straunge: foreign.

amenaunce: conduct, behavior. hire: recompense. 9 sold: wage, service; entertaine: accept, undertake. 10

See ii.42.4n. remaine: await. 12 Arthogall (later spelled Artegall) is the hero of Book Five. “Sophy” is not elsewhere

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7

“Certes” (then said the Prince) “I God avow, That sith I armes and knighthood first did plight,1 My whole desire hath beene, and yet is now, To serve that Queene with al my powre and might. Seven times the Sunne with his lamp-burning2 light, Hath walkte3 about the world, and I no lesse, Sith of that Goddesse I have sought the sight, Yet no where can her find: such happinesse Heven doth to me envy, and fortune favourlesse.”

8

“Fortune, the foe of famous chevisaunce4 Seldome” (said Guyon) “yields to vertue aide, But in her way throwes mischiefe and mischaunce, Whereby her course is stopt, and passage staid. But you, faire Sir, be not herewith dismaid, But constant keepe the way, in which ye stand; Which were it not, that I am els delaid With hard adventure, which I have in hand, I labour would to guide you through al Fary Land.”

9

“Gramercy5 Sir” (said he) “but mote I wote, What straunge adventure doe ye now pursew? Perhaps my succour, or advizement meete Mote stead you much your purpose to subdew.”6 Then gan Sir Guyon all the story shew Of false Acrasia, and her wicked wiles, Which to avenge, the Palmer him forth drew From Faery court.7 So talked they, the whiles They wasted8 had much way, and measurd many miles.

10

And now faire Phoebus gan decline in haste His weary wagon9 to the Westerne vale, Whenas they spide a goodly castle, plaste

mentioned but may have been the intended hero of an unwritten book, perhaps embodying wisdom (Greek sophia). 1 plight: pledge. 2 lamp-burning: shining, or perhaps “outshining the stars.” 3 walkte: moved; i.e., seven years have passed. 4

chevisaunce: chivalric endeavor.

139

5

Gramercy: thank you. stead: aid; subdew: accomplish. 7 This version of the beginning of Guyon’s quest against Acrasia is also recounted at Medina’s castle at ii.43, as well as in “The Letter to Raleigh.” 6

8 9

wasted: traversed. wagon: chariot (of Phoebus, the sun).

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Foreby a river in a pleasaunt dale, Which choosing for that evenings hospitale,1 They thether marcht: but when they came in sight, And from their sweaty Coursers did avale,2 They found the gates fast barred long ere night, And every loup3 fast lockt, as fearing foes despight. 11

Which when they saw, they weened fowle reproch Was to them doen, their entraunce to forstall, Till that the Squire gan nigher to approch, And wind4 his horne under the castle wall, That with the noise it shooke, as it would fall. Eftsoones forth looked from the highest spire The watch,5 and lowd unto the knights did call, To weete, what they so rudely did require. Who gently answered, They entraunce did desire.

12

“Fly fly, good knights,” (said he) “fly fast away If that your lives ye love, as meete6 ye should; Fly fast, and save your selves from neare decay,7 Here may ye not have entraunce, though we would: We would and would againe, if that we could; But thousand enemies about us rave,8 And with long siege us in this castle hould: Seven yeares this wize9 they us besieged have, And many good knights slaine, that have us sought to save.”

13

Thus as he spoke, loe with outragious cry A thousand villeins rownd about them swarmd Out of the rockes and caves adjoyning nye, Vile caitive wretches, ragged, rude, deformd, All threatning death, all in straunge manner armd, Some with unweldy clubs, some with long speares,

1

4

2

5

hospitale: hostel, resting place. avale: dismount. It is not explained how Guyon finds himself on horseback; he does not recover his own horse from Braggadocchio until V.iii.29–35. Spenser seems also to have forgotten about the Palmer, who reappears in Canto Eleven. 3 loup: loophole, an aperture in a castle wall.

wind: blow. watch: watchman. 6 meete: it is fitting. 7 neare decay: imminent destruction. 8 rave: rage. 9 this wize: thus.

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Some rusty knifes, some staves in fier warmd.1 Sterne was their looke, like wild amazed steares,2 Staring with hollow eies, and stiffe upstanding heares. 14

Fiersly at first those knights they did assayle, And drove them to recoile: but when againe They gave fresh charge, their forces gan to fayle, Unhable their encounter to sustaine; For with such puissaunce and impetuous maine3 Those Champions broke on them, that forst them fly, Like scattered Sheepe, whenas the Shepherds swaine4 A Lyon and a Tigre doth espye, With greedy pace forth rushing from the forest nye.

15

A while they fled, but soone retournd againe With greater fury, then before was fownd; And evermore their cruell Capitaine Sought with his raskall routs5 t’enclose them rownd, And overronne to tread them6 to the grownd. But soone the knights with their bright-burning blades Broke their rude troupes, and orders did confownd,7 Hewing and slashing at their idle shades;8 For though they bodies seem, yet substaunce from them fades.

16

As when a swarme of Gnats at eventide Out of the fennes of Allan9 doe arise, Their murmuring small trompetts sownden wide, Whiles in the aire their clustring army flies, That as a cloud doth seeme to dim the skies; Ne man nor beast may rest, or take repast,

1 Heating a wooden staff

in a fire hardens it.

8

2 steares: bulls (not, as in the current use of

9

“steer,” castrated). 3 maine: might. 4 Shepherds swaine: shepherd lad. 5

raskall routs: villainous rabble. I.e., to tread them, overwhelmed. 7 orders did confownd: scattered their ranks. 6

idle shades: empty phantoms. fennes of Allan: a great Irish bog. The simile in this stanza derives partly from personal experience––Spenser lived in Ireland from 1580 until 1598 and specifically mentions the troublesome gnats there (Spenser, View, 57–58)––and partly from classical precedent, e.g., Homer, Iliad, 2.469–73.

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For their sharpe wounds, and noyous1 injuries, Till the fierce Northerne wind with blustring blast Doth blow them quite away, and in the Ocean cast. 17

Thus when they had that troublous rout disperst, Unto the castle gate they come againe, And entraunce crav’d, which was denied erst. Now when report of that their perlous paine,2 And combrous3 conflict, which they did sustaine, Came to the Ladies eare, which there did dwell, Shee forth issewed with a goodly traine Of Squires and Ladies equipaged4 well, And entertained them right fairely, as befell.

18

Alma5 she called was, a virgin bright; That had not yet felt Cupides wanton rage, Yet was shee wooed of many a gentle knight, And many a Lord of noble parentage, That sought with her to lincke in marriage: For shee was faire, as faire mote ever bee, And in the flowre now of her freshest age; Yet full of grace and goodly modestee, That even heven rejoyced her sweete face to see.

19

In robe of lilly white she was arayd, That from her shoulder to her heele downe raught, The traine whereof loose far behind her strayd,6 Braunched7 with gold and perle, most richly wrought, And borne of two faire Damsels, which were taught That service well. Her yellow golden heare Was trimly woven, and in tresses wrought, Ne other tire8 she on her head did weare, But crowned with a garland of sweete Rosiere.9

1

noyous: noxious, irksome. perlous paine: perilous effort. 3 combrous: troublesome. 4 equipaged: outfitted, bedecked. 5 Alma: Latin “nourishing”; Italian “soul.” Both senses are relevant: allegorically, Alma 2

represents the human soul, but she is also at the narrative level a hostess who nurtures mind and body. 6 strayd: trailed. 7 Braunched: embroidered. 8 tire: headdress. 9 Rosiere: rosebush.

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20

Goodly shee entertaind those noble knights, And brought them up into her castle hall; Where gentle court and gracious delight Shee to them made, with mildnesse virginall, Shewing her selfe both wise and liberall:1 Then when they rested had a season dew,2 They her besought of favour speciall, Of that faire Castle to affoord them vew; Shee graunted, and them leading forth, the same did shew.

21

First she them led up to the Castle wall, That was so high, as foe might not it clime, And all so faire, and fensible3 withall, Not built of bricke, ne yet of stone and lime,4 But of thing like to that Aegyptian slime, Whereof king Nine whilome built Babell towre,5 But O great pitty, that no lenger time So goodly workemanship should not endure: Soone it must turne to earth; no earthly thing is sure.

22

The frame thereof seemd partly circulare, And part triangulare, O worke divine;6 Those two the first and last proportions are,

1

liberall: generous, free. season dew: proper or necessary time. 3 fensible: able to be defended. Later editions read “sensible,” which may be a compositor’s error (the printed letters s and f are sometimes almost indistinguishable in the sixteenth century), but which is also defensible and in some ways preferable on semantic grounds. Alma’s castle, as we now learn, is the human body; hence its wall is “sensible”––endowed with sense. 4 lime: mortar. 5 Spenser conflates a number of traditions. The story of the Tower of Babel is given in Gen. 11.1–9. “Nine,” or Ninus, was the legendary founder of Nineveh (which is north of Babylon). The term “Aegyptian” is used loosely but is important, since the “slime” or mud of the Nile was said to be endowed with peculiar life or fecundity. 6 This stanza has the distinction of being the subject of one of the earliest critical mono2

143

graphs concerning a work of English literature, a 1643 pamphlet by Sir Kenelm Digby (see Bibliography). The stanza’s imagery works on at least two levels. In the first place, it gives a schematic description of a human body: a circle (the head), a triangle (the legs), and “twixt them both a quadrate”––the rectangle of the torso, the rough proportions of which, in terms of breadth and length, are given in line 7. At the same time, the numbers and figures have more abstract implications. Digby suggests that the circle represents the soul, “immortall” and “perfect” because it has no beginning or end; the triangle represents the body, which is “imperfect” and “mortall” in that (like a triangle) it is finite. But these interpretations, and especially the mystical numerology and the identification of different elements as masculine and feminine, remain matters of scholarly debate. See Variorum, Appendix XI; and Fowler 1964, 260–88.

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The one imperfect, mortall, foeminine; Th’other immortall, perfect, masculine, And twixt them both a quadrate was the base, Proportioned equally by seven and nine; Nine was the circle sett in heavens place, All which compacted made a goodly diapase.1 23

Therein two gates2 were placed seemly well: The one before, by which all in did pas, Did th’other far in workmanship excell; For not of wood, nor of enduring bras, But of more worthy substance fram’d3 it was; Doubly disparted,4 it did locke and close, That when it locked, none might thorough pas, And when it opened, no man might it close, Still open to their friendes, and closed to their foes.

24

Of hewen5 stone the porch was fayrely wrought, Stone more of valew, and more smooth and fine, Then Jett6 or Marble far from Ireland brought; Over the which was cast a wandring vine, Enchaced7 with a wanton yvie twine. And over it fayre Portcullis8 hong, Which to the gate directly did incline, With comely compasse, and compacture9 strong, Nether unseemly short, nor yet exceeding long.

25

Within the Barbican10 a Porter sate, Day and night duely keeping watch and ward, Nor wight, nor word mote passe out of the gate,

1

compacted: put together, in agreement; diapase: octave. The structuring of the body, or of body and soul, constitutes a complete harmony, like a musical scale. 2 I.e., the mouth and the anus. 3 fram’d: constructed. 4 Doubly disparted: parted in two halves. 5 hewen: hewn, cut. 6 Jett: black marble (distinct from the usual current sense, a black stone used in jewelry).

7

Enchaced: inlaid. The mingling vine and strand of ivy (“yvie twine”) on the porch probably represent facial hair. 8 Portcullis: descending gate of a castle (the nose). 9 comely compasse: correct proportion; compacture: compact structure. 10 Barbican: outer defensive portion of a castle (the mouth, with the tongue as porter).

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But in good order, and with dew regard; Utterers of secrets he from thence debard, Bablers of folly, and blazers1 of cryme. His larumbell2 might lowd and wyde be hard, When cause requyrd, but never out of time; Early and late it rong, at evening and at prime.3 26

And rownd about the porch on every syde Twise sixteene warders satt,4 all armed bright, In glistring steele, and strongly fortifyde: Tall yeomen5 seemed they, and of great might, And were enraunged6 ready, still for fight. By them as Alma passed with her guestes, They did obeysaunce,7 as beseemed right, And then againe returned to their restes: The Porter eke to her did lout with humble gestes.8

27

Thence she them brought into a stately Hall, Wherein were many tables fayre dispred,9 And ready dight with drapets festivall,10 Against the viaundes should be ministred.11 At th’upper end there sate, yclad in red Downe to the ground, a comely personage, That in his hand a white rod menaged, He Steward12 was hight Diet; rype of age, And in demeanure sober, and in counsell sage.

28

And through the Hall there walked to and fro A jolly yeoman, Marshall of the same, Whose name was Appetite; he did bestow13 Both guestes and meate, when ever in they came, And knew them how to order without blame,14

1

blazers: reporters. larumbell: alarm bell. 3 prime: dawn. 4 I.e., the thirty-two teeth. 5 yeomen: royal guards, sturdy men. 2

6

enraunged: drawn up. did obeysaunce: bowed. 8 lout: bow; gestes: motions. 7

9 dispred: spread out; we are now entering the digestive tract. 10 drapets festivall: festive drapery. 11 I.e., for when the food would be served. 12 Steward: household officer in charge of food. 13 14

bestow: usher, arrange. blame: fault.

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As him the Steward badd. They both attone1 Did dewty2 to their Lady, as became; Who passing by, forth ledd her guestes anone Into the kitchin rowme, ne spard for nicenesse none.3 29

It was a vaut ybuilt for great dispence,4 With many raunges5 reard along the wall; And one great chimney, whose long tonnell thence, The smoke forth threw. And in the midst of all There placed was a caudron wide and tall, Upon a mightie fornace, burning whott, More whott, then Aetn’, or flaming Mongiball:6 For day and night it brent,7 ne ceased not, So long as any thing it in the caudron gott.

30

But to delay the heat, least by mischaunce It might breake out, and set the whole on fyre, There added was by goodly ordinaunce,8 An huge great payre of bellowes, which did styre9 Continually, and cooling breath inspyre.10 About the Caudron many Cookes accoyld,11 With hookes and ladles, as need did requyre; The whyles the viaundes12 in the vessell boyld They did about their businesse sweat, and sorely toyld.

31

The maister Cooke was cald Concoction,13 A carefull man, and full of comely guyse:14 The kitchin clerke,15 that hight Digestion, Did order all th’Achates16 in seemely wise,

1

attone: together. Did dewty: bowed. 3 Nor hesitated at all out of fastidiousness (to show guests into her “kitchin,” the stomach). 4 I.e., it was a vaulted chamber built to produce a great deal. 5 raunges: fireplaces. 6 Mongiball: another name for Aetna, the volcano in Sicily. 2

7

brent: burned. ordinaunce: order. 9 styre: stir, act. 8

10

inspyre: blow into (the cauldron). The “bellowes” are apparently the lungs. 11 accoyld: gathered (OED, citing this instance). 12 viaundes: food. 13 Concoction: the first stage of digestion. 14 guyse: manners. 15 clerke: superintendent. 16 th’Achates: the provisions, specifically those that are bought rather than homegrown.

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And set them forth, as well he could devise. The rest had severall offices1 assynd, Some to remove the scum, as it did rise; Others to beare the same away did mynd; And others it to use according to his kynd.2 32

But all the liquour,3 which was fowle and waste, Not good nor serviceable elles for ought, They in another great rownd vessell plaste, Till by a conduit pipe it thence were brought: And all the rest, that noyous was, and nought,4 By secret wayes, that none might it espy, Was close5 convaid, and to the backgate brought, That cleped was Port Esquiline,6 whereby It was avoided quite, and throwne out privily.7

33

Which goodly order, and great workmans skill Whenas those knightes beheld, with rare delight, And gazing wonder they their mindes did fill; For never had they seene so straunge a sight. Thence backe againe faire Alma led them right, And soone into a goodly Parlour brought, That was with royall arras8 richly dight, In which was nothing pourtrahed,9 nor wrought, Not wrought, not pourtrahed, but easie to be thought.

34

And in the midst thereof upon the floure,10 A lovely bevy of faire Ladies sate, Courted of many a jolly Paramoure, The which them did in modest wise amate,11 And eachone sought his Lady to aggrate:12 And eke emongst them litle Cupid playd

1

severall offices: various functions. his kynd: its nature. 3 liquour: liquid. 4 noyous: unwholesome; nought: useless. 5 close: nearby, secretly. 6 cleped: called; Port Esquiline: the gate (porta) in Rome outside of which refuse was deposited. 2

7 avoided: expelled; privily: secretly (with a play on “privy,” a toilet). 8 arras: tapestry; “royall” may indicate purple, an appropriate color for the heart (Hamilton). 9 pourtrahed: portrayed. 10 floure: floor. 11 amate: accompany. 12 aggrate: please.

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His wanton sportes, being retourned late From his fierce warres, and having from him layd His cruel bow, wherewith he thousands hath dismayd. 35

Diverse delights they fownd them selves to please; Some song in sweet consort,1 some laught for joy, Some plaid2 with strawes, some ydly satt at ease, But other some could not abide to toy,3 All pleasaunce was to them griefe and annoy: This fround, that faund,4 the third for shame did blush, Another seemed envious, or coy, Another in her teeth did gnaw a rush: But at these straungers presence every one did hush.

36

Soone as the gracious Alma came in place, They all attonce out of their seates arose, And to her homage made, with humble grace: Whom when the knights beheld, they gan dispose Themselves to court and each a damzell chose: The Prince by chaunce did on a Lady light, That was right faire and fresh as morning rose, But somwhat sad, and solemne eke in sight, As if some pensive thought constraind5 her gentle spright.

37

In a long purple pall,6 whose skirt with gold, Was fretted7 all about, she was arayd; And in her hand a Poplar8 braunch did hold: To whom the prince in courteous maner sayd, “Gentle Madame, why beene ye thus dismayd, And your faire beautie doe with sadnes spill?9 Lives any, that you hath thus ill apayd?10 Or doen your love, or doen you lack your will? What ever bee the cause, it sure beseemes you ill.”

1

6

2

7

consort: concert, harmony. plaid: played; the nature of their game is uncertain. 3 toy: trifle. 4 faund: fawned, perhaps here meaning cringed (Hamilton). 5 constraind: weighed upon.

pall: robe. fretted: decorated, laced. 8 The poplar was associated with Hercules (see v.31.5n.) and hence with glory. 9 spill: spoil. 10 ill apayd: done wrong.

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38

“Fayre Sir,” said she halfe in disdainefull wise, “How is it, that this word1 in me ye blame, And in your selfe doe not the same advise? Him ill beseemes, anothers fault to name, That may unwares bee blotted with the same: Pensive I yeeld I am, and sad in mind, Through great desire of glory and of fame; Ne ought I weene are ye therein behynd, That have three years2 sought one, yet no where can her find.”

39

The Prince was inly moved at her speach, Well weeting trew, what she had rashly told, Yet with faire semblaunt sought to hyde the breach,3 Which chaunge of colour did perforce unfold,4 Now seeming flaming whott, now stony cold. Tho turning soft aside, he did inquyre What wight she was, that Poplar braunch did hold: It answered was, her name was Praysdesire,5 That by well doing sought to honour to aspyre.

40

The whyles, the Faery knight did entertayne Another Damsell of that gentle crew, That was right fayre, and modest of demayne,6 But that too oft she chaung’d her native hew: Straunge was her tyre, and all her garment blew,7 Close rownd about her tuckt with many a plight:8 Upon her fist the bird, which shonneth vew And keepes in coverts close from living wight, Did sitt, as yet ashamd, how rude Pan did her dight.9

1 word: the “sadnes” or dismay that Arthur mentions. 2 According to 7.5–8, above, it has been seven years that Arthur has sought Gloriana; in 1596, both passages were changed to indicate one year. 3 semblaunt: appearance, pretense; breach: hurt. 4 unfold: reveal. 5 The quality of which Philotime (vii. 44–49), whose name means essentially the same thing in Greek, represents the excess.

6

demayne: demeanor. tyre: apparel; blew: blue, which sometimes represents modesty, as for instance in pictures of the Virgin Mary. 8 plight: pleat. 9 dight: ravish. There is no known source for a story in which Pan, the woodland god, ravishes a maiden who is then turned into a secretive bird. Hence the bird remains (appropriately) unidentified. 7

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41

So long as Guyon with her commoned,1 Unto the grownd she cast her modest eye, And ever and anone with rosy red The bashfull blood her snowy cheekes did dye, That her became, as polisht yvory, Which cunning Craftesman hand hath overlayd With fayre vermilion or pure Castory.2 Great wonder had the knight, to see the mayd So straungely passioned, and to her gently said.

42

“Fayre Damzell, seemeth, by your troubled cheare,3 That either me too bold ye weene, this wise You to molest,4 or other ill to feare That in the secret of your hart close lyes, From whence it doth, as cloud from sea aryse. If it be I, of pardon I you pray; But if ought else that I mote not devyse,5 I will, if please you it discure,6 assay, To ease you of that ill, so wisely as I may.”

43

She answerd nought, but more abasht for shame, Held downe her head, the whiles her lovely face, The flashing blood with blushing did inflame, And the strong passion mard her modest grace, That Guyon mervayld at her uncouth cace; Till Alma him bespake, “Why wonder yee Faire Sir at that, which ye so much embrace?7 She is the fountaine of your modestee; You shamefast are, but Shamefastnes 8 it selfe is shee.”

44

Thereat the Elfe did blush in privitee, And turnd his face away; but she the same Dissembled faire, and faynd to oversee.9 Thus they awhile with court and goodly game,10

1

6

2

7

commoned: conversed. Castory: a reddish dye derived from musk. 3 cheare: face, expression. 4 molest: disturb. 5 devyse: guess.

discure: discover, reveal. embrace: espouse. 8 Shamefastnes: modesty. 9 oversee: overlook. 10 game: pleasantry.

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Themselves did solace1 each one with his Dame, Till that great Lady thence away them sought, To vew her Castles other wondrous frame.2 Up to a stately Turret she them brought, Ascending by ten steps of Alablaster3 wrought. 45

That Turrets frame most admirable was, Like highest heaven compassed around, And lifted high above this earthly masse, Which it survewd, as hils doen lower ground; But not on ground mote like to this be found, Not that, which antique Cadmus whylome built In Thebes, which Alexander did confound;4 Nor that proud towre of Troy, though richly guilt,5 From which young Hectors blood by cruell Greekes was spilt.6

46

The roofe hereof was arched over head, And deckt with flowers and herbars7 daintily; Two goodly Beacons, set in watches stead,8 Therein gave light, and flamd continually: For they of living fire most subtilly,9 Were made, and set in silver sockets bright, Cover’d with lids deviz’d of substance sly,10 That readily they shut and open might. O who can tell the prayses of that makers might?

47

Ne can I tell, ne can I stay to tell This parts great workemanship, and wondrous powre, That all this other worldes worke doth excell, And likest is unto that heavenly towre, That God hath built for his owne blessed bowre.

1

solace: amuse. frame: structure. 3 Alablaster: alabaster, a translucent white stone. The steps are vertebrae. 4 Cadmus was the legendary founder of the Greek city of Thebes, razed by Alexander the Great in 335 BC. 5 guilt: gilt, though with a suggestion of guiltiness as well. 2

6

When the Greeks finally captured Troy, they killed Hector’s young son Astyanax by throwing him off the Trojan citadel.

7

herbars: arbors (the hair). in watches stead: in place of watchmen. 9 subtilly: finely, artfully. 10 sly: ingenious. 8

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Therein were divers rowmes, and divers stages,1 But three the chiefest, and of greatest powre, In which there dwelt three honorable sages, The wisest men, I weene, that lived in their ages. 48

Not he, whom Greece, the Nourse2 of all good arts, By Phoebus doome, the wisest thought alive,3 Might be compar’d to these by many parts:4 Nor that sage Pylian syre,5 which did survive Three ages, such as mortall men contrive,6 By whose advise old Priams cittie fell, With these in praise of pollicies7 mote strive. These three in these three rowmes did sondry8 dwell, And counselled faire Alma, how to governe well.

49

The first of them could things to come foresee; The next could of thinges present best advize; The third things past could keepe in memoree, So that no time, nor reason could arize, But that the same could one of these comprize.9 For thy the first did in the forepart sit, That nought mote hinder his quicke prejudize:10 He had a sharpe foresight, and working11 wit, That never idle was, ne once would rest a whit.

50

His chamber was dispainted12 all with in, With sondry colours, in the which were writ13 Infinite shapes of thinges dispersed thin;14 Some such as in the world were never yit,

1

stages: levels, stories. Nourse: nurse. 3 Socrates was the wisest man alive, according to the judgment (“doome”) of the oracle of Phoebus at Delphi. 2

4

parts: degrees. Pylian syre: Nestor, king of Pylos, who according to Homer outlived three generations. His wisdom helped the Greeks conquer King Priam’s city, Troy. 5

6

contrive: spend, wear out. in praise of pollicies: for the excellence of their counsel. 8 sondry: separately. 9 comprize: understand. 10 prejudize: prejudgment. 11 working: busy. 12 dispainted: painted. 13 writ: depicted. 14 thin: widely. 7

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153

Ne can devized1 be of mortall wit; Some daily seene, and knowen by their names, Such as in idle fantasies doe flit: Infernall Hags, Centaurs, feendes, Hippodames,2 Apes, Lyons, Aegles, Owles, fooles, lovers, children, Dames. 51

And all the chamber filled was with flyes, Which buzzed all about, and made such sound, That they encombred all mens eares and eyes, Like many swarmes of Bees assembled round, After their hives with honny do abound: All those were idle thoughtes and fantasies, Devices, dreames, opinions unsound, Shewes, visions, sooth-sayes,3 and prophesies; And all that fained is, as leasings,4 tales, and lies.

52

Emongst them all sate he, which wonned there, That hight Phantastes 5 by his nature trew, A man of yeares yet fresh, as mote appere, Of swarth complexion, and of crabbed hew,6 That him full of melancholy did shew; Bent hollow beetle browes, sharpe staring eyes, That mad or foolish seemd: one by his vew Mote deeme him borne with ill disposed skyes, When oblique Saturne sate in the house of agonyes.7

53

Whom Alma having shewed to her guestes, Thence brought them to the second rowme, whose wals Were painted faire with memorable gestes,8 Of famous Wisards, and with picturals9 Of Magistrates, of courts, of tribunals,

1

devized: conceived. Centaurs are half man, half horse. “Hippodames” may mean hippocamps (seahorses, which are half horse, half fish, as at III.xi.40.9), or hippopotami, or perhaps hippo-dames––half horse, half woman.

5 Phantastes: fantasy, imagination, from Greek phantasma, “image” or “dream.” 6 crabbed hew: cross looks. 7 These are all astrological terms suggesting an adverse or melancholy horoscope; “house” means a sector of the sky.

3

8

2

Shewes: apparitions; sooth-sayes: predictions. 4 leasings: falsehoods.

9

gestes: deeds. picturals: pictures.

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154

Of commen wealthes, of states, of pollicy, Of lawes, of judgementes, and of decretals;1 All artes, all science, all Philosophy, And all that in the world was ay thought wittily.2 54

Of those that rowme was full, and them among There sate a man of ripe and perfect3 age, Who did them meditate4 all his life long, That through continuall practise and usage,5 He now was growne right wise, and wondrous sage. Great plesure had those straunger knightes, to see His goodly reason, and grave personage, That his disciples both desyrd to bee; But Alma thence them led to th’hindmost rowme of three.

55

That chamber seemed ruinous and old, And therefore was removed far behind, Yet were the wals, that did the same uphold, Right firme and strong, though somwhat they declind;6 And therein sat an old oldman, halfe blind, And all decrepit in his feeble corse, Yet lively vigour rested7 in his mind, And recompenst him with a better scorse:8 Weake body well is chang’d for minds redoubled forse.

56

This man of infinite remembraunce was, And things foregone through many ages held,9 Which he recorded still, as they did pas, Ne suffred them to perish through long eld,10 As all things els, the which this world doth weld,11 But laid them up in his immortall scrine,12

1

7

2

8

decretals: decrees. wittily: wisely. 3 perfect: mature. 4 meditate: ponder. 5 usage: habitual activity. 6 declind: sloped.

rested: remained. scorse: exchange. 9 held: retained. 10 eld: age. 11 weld: wield, possess. 12 scrine: reliquary, strongbox.

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155

Where they for ever incorrupted1 dweld: The warres he well remembred of king Nine, Of old Assaracus, and Inachus divine.2 57

The yeares of Nestor 3 nothing were to his, Ne yet Mathusalem though longest liv’d;4 For he remembred both their infancis: Ne wonder then, if that he were depriv’d Of native strength now, that he them surviv’d. His chamber all was hangd about with rolls, And old records from auncient times derivd, Some made in books, some in long parchment scrolls, That were all worm-eaten, and full of canker holes.5

58

Amidst them all he in a chaire was sett, Tossing and turning them withouten end; But for he was unhable them to fett,6 A litle boy did on him still attend, To reach, when ever he for ought did send; And oft when thinges were lost, or laid amis, That boy them sought, and unto him did lend.7 Therefore he Anamnestes 8 cleped is, And that old man Eumnestes,9 by their propertis.

59

The knightes there entring, did him reverence dew And wondred at his endlesse exercise,10 Then as they gan his Library to vew, And antique Regesters for to avise,11 There chaunced to the Princes hand to rize, An auncient booke, hight Briton moniments,12

1

7

2

8

incorrupted: undecaying. On “Nine,” see above, 21.6n.; Assaracus was an early Trojan, ancestor of Aeneas; Inachus was the mythical founder of Argos. 3 See above, 48.4n. 4 Methuselah was “longest liv’d” of the biblical patriarchs, at 969 years (Gen. 5.27). 5 canker holes: worm holes. 6

fett: fetch.

lend: give. Anamnestes: reminder, from Greek anamnesis, “recollection” (a central term in Plato’s Meno, especially 81ff.). 9 Eumnestes: memory, from Greek eumnestos, “well-remembering.” 10 exercise: activity, work. 11 avise: look at. 12 moniments: records.

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That of this lands first conquest did devize,1 And old division into Regiments,2 Till it reduced was to one mans governements. 60

1

Sir Guyon chaunst eke on another booke, That hight, Antiquitee of Faery lond. In which whenas he greedily did looke, Th’ofspring3 of Elves and Faryes there he fond, As it delivered was from hond to hond: Whereat they burning both with fervent fire, Their countreys auncestry to understond, Crav’d leave of Alma, and that aged sire, To read those bookes; who gladly graunted their desire.

devize: treat. Regiments: small kingdoms. According to legend, Arthur (the “one man” of the following line) united all of Britain.

2

3

ofspring: genealogy, derivation.

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Canto Ten A chronicle of Briton kings, From Brute to Uthers rayne,1 And rolls of Elfin Emperours, Till time of Gloriane.

1

Who now shall give unto me words and sound, Equall unto this haughty2 enterprise? Or who shall lend me wings, with which from ground My lowly verse may loftily arise, And lift it selfe unto the highest skyes? More ample spirit, then hetherto was wount, Here needes me,3 whiles the famous auncestryes Of my most dreaded4 Soveraigne I recount, By which all earthly Princes she doth far surmount.5

2

Ne under Sunne, that shines so wide and faire, Whence all that lives, does borrow life and light, Lives ought, that to her linage may compaire, Which though from earth it be derived right,6 Yet doth it selfe stretch forth to hevens hight, And all the world with wonder overspred; A labor huge, exceeding far my might: How shall fraile pen, with feare disparaged,7 Conceive such soveraine glory, and great bountyhed?

1

Brute, or Brutus, is the legendary founder and namesake of Britain; see below, 9.7n. Uther is the father of Arthur. On Spenser’s chronicle of British history in this canto, its sources, analogues, and importance, see Introduction, Section 4. 2 3

haughty: lofty. Here needes me: I now require.

4

dreaded: revered. surmount: surpass. This whole stanza and parts of those that follow form a very close imitation of the beginning of Canto 3 of Ariosto, Orlando Furioso. 6 right: naturally, justly. 7 disparaged: cast down. 5

157

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158 3

Argument worthy of Moeonian quill,1 Or rather worthy of great Phoebus rote,2 Whereon the ruines of great Ossa hill, And triumphes of Phlegraean Jove he wrote,3 That all the Gods admird his lofty note. But if some relish4 of that hevenly lay His learned daughters would to me report,5 To decke my song withall, I would assay, Thy name, O soveraine Queene, to blazon6 far away.

4

Thy name O soveraine Queene, thy realme and race, From this renowmed Prince7 derived arre, Who mightily upheld that royall mace,8 Which now thou bear’st, to thee descended farre From mighty kings and conquerours in warre, Thy fathers and great Grandfathers of old, Whose noble deeds above the Northern starre Immortall fame for ever hath enrold; As in that old mans booke they were in order told.9

5

The land, which warlike Britons now possesse, And therein have their mighty empire raysd, In antique times was salvage wildernesse, Unpeopled, unmannurd,10 unproud, unpraysd, Ne was it Island then, ne was it paysd11 Amid the Ocean waves, ne was it sought Of merchaunts farre, for profits therein praysd, But was all desolate, and of some thought By sea to have bene from the Celticke mayn-land12 brought.

1

Moeonian quill: pen or instrument of Homer (who is sometimes known as “Maeonides”). 2 Phoebus rote: Apollo’s lyre. 3

wrote: composed. Apollo is pictured singing the story of the giants’ attempted revolt against Jupiter (Jove) at Phlegra, when they piled Mount Ossa on Mount Pelion. 4 relish: taste, hint. 5 report: transmit, relate. The “learned daughters” of Apollo are the Muses. 6

blazon: proclaim.

7

I.e., Arthur. mace: scepter. 9 All that follows up to stanza 68 is being read by Arthur in the book he found in the library of Eumnestes (“that old man”) at the end of the previous canto. 10 unmannurd: uncultivated. 11 paysd: balanced, poised. 8

12 I.e., France, in particular Brittany, which Celtic tribes inhabited and which lies directly across the Channel from southern England.

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6

Ne did it then deserve a name to have, Till that the venturous Mariner that way Learning his ship from those white rocks to save, Which all along the Southerne sea-coast lay,1 Threatning unheedy wrecke and rash decay,2 For safety that same his sea-marke made, And namd it Albion. But later day3 Finding in it fit ports for fishers trade, Gan more the same frequent, and further to invade.4

7

But far in land a salvage nation dwelt, Of hideous Giaunts, and halfe beastly men, That never tasted grace, nor goodnes felt, But like wild beastes lurking in loathsome den, And flying fast as Roebucke5 through the fen, All naked without shame, or care of cold, By hunting and by spoiling liveden;6 Of stature huge, and eke of corage bold, That sonnes of men amazd their sternesse7 to behold.

8

But whence they sprong, or how they were begott, Uneath is to assure, uneath to wene8 That monstrous error, which doth some assott,9 That Dioclesians fifty daughters shene10 Into this land by chaunce have driven bene, Where companing11 with feends and filthy Sprights Through vaine illusion12 of their lust unclene, They brought forth Geaunts and such dreadful wights, As far exceeded men in their immeasurd mights.

1 The famous white chalk cliffs of southeast England, from which the traditional name of “Albion” (line 7) is derived (Latin albus, white). 2 I.e., threatening wreck and destruction to the heedless and rash. 3 day: times. 4 invade: enter, explore. 5 Roebucke: male red deer, as at ii.7.4. 6 liveden: lived. 7 sternesse: formidableness. 8 assure: ascertain; wene: believe.

9

159

assott: dupe, make foolish. shene: bright, beautiful. According to a legend (which Spenser considers a “monstrous error”), all but one of the thirty daughters of Dioclesian, King of Syria, killed their husbands on their wedding night. In making the number fifty, Spenser conflates this legend with the almost identical classical myth of the Danaides. 11 companing: consorting. 12 vaine illusion: deceptive influence. 10

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9

They held this land, and with their filthinesse Polluted this same gentle soyle long time: That their owne mother1 loathd their beastlinesse, And gan abhorre her broods unkindly2 crime, All were they borne of her owne native slime;3 Until that Brutus anciently deriv’d From roiall stocke of old Assaracs line,4 Driven by fatall error,5 here arriv’d, And them of their unjust possession depriv’d.

10

But ere he had established his throne, And spred his empire to the utmost shore, He fought great batteils with his salvage fone;6 In which he them defeated evermore, And many Giaunts left on groning flore, That well can witnes yet unto this day The westerne Hogh,7 besprincled with the gore Of mighty Goëmot, whome in stout fray Corineus conquered, and cruelly did slay.

11

And eke that ample Pitt, yet far renownd, For the large leape, which Debon did compell Coulin to make, being eight lugs8 of grownd; Into the which retourning backe,9 he fell, But those three monstrous stones doe most excell10 Which that huge sonne of hideous Albion, Whose father Hercules in Fraunce did quell,11 Great Godmer threw, in fierce contention, At bold Canutus;12 but of him was slaine anon.

1

The giants’ mother is the land of Britain (line 5); Spenser dismisses the legendary genealogy of the previous stanza. 2 unkindly: unnatural. 3 All were they: although they were; slime: soil. 4 Brutus was a descendant of Aeneas, who was a descendant of Assaracus, one of the founders of Troy. 5

fatall error: wandering ordained by fate; cf. Virgil, Aeneid, 1.2 (Hamilton).

6

fone: foes. Hogh: Plymouth Hoe (i.e., Hill), at the southwestern extremity of England. 8 lugs: measures of roughly twenty feet. 7

9

retourning backe: tumbling backward. doe most excell: i.e., are best witnesses of all (to the battle of giants and men). 10 11

quell: vanquish, kill. This mythical Canutus is Spenser’s invention, not to be confused with the Danish king of England (ruled 1016–1035). 12

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12

In meed of these great conquests by them gott, Corineus had that Province utmost west, To him assigned for his worthy lott, Which of his name and memorable gest1 He called Cornwaile, yet so called best: And Debons shayre was, that is Devonshyre: But Canute had his portion from2 the rest, The which he cald Canutium, for his hyre;3 Now Cantium, which Kent we comenly inquyre.4

13

Thus Brute this Realme unto his rule subdewd, And raigned long in great felicity, Lov’d of his friends, and of his foes eschewd,5 He left three sonnes, his famous progeny, Borne of fayre Inogene of Italy; Mongst whom he parted his imperiall state, And Locrine left chiefe Lord of Britany.6 At last ripe age bad him surrender late His life, and long good fortune unto finall fate.

14

Locrine was left the soveraine Lord of all; But Albanact had all the Northerne part, Which of him selfe Albania7 he did call; And Camber did possesse the Westerne quart,8 Which Severne now from Logris doth depart:9 And each his portion peaceably enjoyd, Ne was there outward breach, nor grudge in hart, That once their quiet government annoyd,10 But each his paynes11 to others profit still employd.

1

gest: deed. from: apart from; Kent is in the southeast of England, Cornwall and Devonshire in the southwest. 3 hyre: reward. 4 inquyre: call. 5 eschewd: avoided. 6 I.e., Britain. 7 Albania: Scotland. 2

161

8 quart: quarter, area; Camber’s region is Wales (Latin Cambria). 9 depart: separate. The river Severn (see stanza 19 below) forms part of the border between Wales and England (Logris, realm of Locrine). 10 11

annoyd: disturbed. paynes: efforts.

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15

Untill a nation straung, with visage swart,1 And corage fierce, that all men did affray, Which through the world then swarmd in every part, And overflow’d all countries far away, Like Noyes great flood, with their importune sway,2 This land invaded with like violence, And did themselves through all the North display:3 Untill that Locrine for his Realmes defence, Did head against them make, and strong munificence.4

16

He them encountred, a confused rout, Foreby the River, that whylome was hight The ancient Abus, where with courage stout He them defeated in victorious fight, And chaste so fiercely after fearefull flight, That forst their Chiefetain, for his safeties sake, (Their Chiefetain Humber named was aright,)5 Unto the mighty streame him to betake, Where he an end of batteill, and of life did make.

17

The king retourned proud of victory, And insolent wox through unwonted6 ease, That shortly he forgot the jeopardy, Which in his land he lately did appease,7 And fell to vaine voluptuous disease:8 He lov’d faire Ladie Estrild, leudly9 lov’d, Whose wanton pleasures him too much did please, That quite his hart from Guendolene remov’d, From Guendolene his wife, though alwaies faithful prov’d.

18

The noble daughter of Corineus Would not endure to bee so vile disdaind, But gathering force, and corage valorous,

1

straung: strange, foreign; swart: swarthy, dark.

2

Noyes: Noah’s; importune sway: troublesome power. 3 display: spread out. 4 munificence: fortification, defense.

5

The Humber is a major river in northern England, for which Spenser here provides a legendary etymology.

6

wox: waxed, became; unwonted: unaccustomed. 7 appease: subdue. 8 disease: intemperance. 9 leudly: lewdly, lustfully.

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Encountred him in batteill well ordaind,1 In which him vanquisht she to fly constraind: But she so fast pursewd, that him she tooke, And threw in bands, where he till death remaind; Als his faire Leman,2 flying through a brooke, She overhent,3 nought moved with her piteous looke. 19

But both her selfe, and eke her daughter deare, Begotten by her kingly Paramoure, The faire Sabrina almost dead with feare, She there attached,4 far from all succoure; The one she slew upon the present floure,5 But the sad virgin innocent of all, Adowne the rolling river she did poure, Which of her name now Severne men do call:6 Such was the end, that to disloyall love did fall.

20

Then for7 her sonne, which she to Locrin bore, Madan was young, unmeet the rule to sway,8 In her owne hand the crowne she kept in store, Till ryper yeares he raught, and stronger stay:9 During which time her powre she did display10 Through all this realme, the glory of her sex, And first taught men a woman to obay: But when her sonne to mans estate did wex, She it surrendred, ne her selfe would lenger vex.

21

Tho Madan raignd, unworthie of his race: For with all shame that sacred throne he fild:11 Next Memprise, as unworthy of that place, In which being consorted12 with Manild, For thirst of single kingdom13 him he kild. But Ebranck salved14 both their infamies

1

7

2

8

ordaind: prepared. Leman: lover. 3 overhent: overtook. 4 attached: arrested, seized. 5 upon the present floure: in that very place (Hamilton). 6

The story of Sabrina’s giving her name to the river Severn is retold in Milton’s Comus (1634), lines 823–41.

for: since. unmeet: unable; sway: bear. 9 stay: power. 10 display: spread, demonstrate. 11 fild: filled, defiled. 12 consorted: paired. 13 single kingdom: sole rule. 14 salved: redeemed.

163

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With noble deedes, and warreyd1 on Brunchild In Henault,2 where yet of his victories Brave moniments remaine, which yet that land envies.3 22

An happy man in his first dayes he was, And happy father of faire progeny: For all so many weekes, as the yeare has, So many children he did multiply; Of which were twentie sonnes, which did apply, Their mindes to prayse, and chevalrous desyre: Those germans4 did subdew all Germany, Of whom it hight;5 but in the end their Syre With foule repulse from Fraunce was forced to retyre.

23

Which blott his sonne succeeding in his seat, The second Brute, the second both in name, And eke in semblaunce of his puissaunce great, Right well recur’d,6 and did away that blame With recompence of everlasting fame. He with his victour sword first opened, The bowels of wide Fraunce, a forlorne Dame, And taught her first how to be conquered; Since which, with sondrie spoiles she hath been ransacked.

24

Let Scaldis tell, and let tell Hania, And let the marsh of Estham bruges tell, What colour were their waters that same day, And all the moore twixt Elversham and Dell, With blood of Henalois, which therein fell.7 How oft that day did sad Brunchildis see The greene shield dyde in dolorous vermell?8 That not Scuith guiridh he mote seeme to bee, But rather y Scuith gogh,9 signe of sad crueltee.

1

warreyd: made war. Henault: Hainaut, region of southern Belgium.

2 3

envies: begrudges. germans: brothers. 5 Of whom it hight: after whom it is named. 6 recur’d: recovered, rectified. 4

7

The place names are all intended to suggest the region of Hainaut (see above, 21.8n.). 8 greene shield: the traditional nickname of Brutus; vermell: vermilion, bright red. 9 Scuith guiridh / y Scuith gogh: green shield, red shield (Welsh). These lines repeat the gist of line 7, that Brutus’ defeat of Brunchild (note the possible pun on “brown shield”) was so bloody as to belie his traditional

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25

His sonne king Leill by fathers labour long, Enjoyd an heritage of lasting peace, And built Cairleill, and built Cairleon strong. Next Huddibras his realme did not encrease, But taught the land from wearie wars to cease. Whose footsteps Bladud following, in artes Exceld at Athens all the learned preace,1 From whence he brought them to these salvage parts And with sweet science mollifide2 their stubborne harts.

26

Ensample of his wondrous faculty,3 Behold the boyling Bathes at Cairbadon, Which seeth with secret fire eternally, And in their entrailles, full of quick Brimston,4 Nourish the flames, which they are warmd upon, That to their people wealth they forth do well,5 And health to every forreyne nation: Yet he at last contending to excell The reach of men, through flight into fond mischief 6 fell.

27

Next him king Leyr7 in happie peace long raynd, But had no issue8 male him to succeed, But three faire daughters, which were well uptraind, In all that seemed fitt for kingly seed: Mongst whom his realme he equally decreed To have divided. Tho when feeble age Nigh to his utmost date9 he saw proceed, He cald his daughters; and with speeches sage Inquyrd, which of them most did love her parentage.

epithet. The use of Welsh––which so puzzled the printer in 1590 that he simply left blank spaces––is a tribute to the Welsh ancestry of Queen Elizabeth. 1 preace: throng. 2 science: learning; mollifide: softened, cultivated. 3 faculty: ability. 4 quick: life-giving, lively (i.e., bubbling); Brimston: brimstone, sulfur. Lines 1–7 refer to the natural hot springs at Bath (Cairbadon), which contain minerals including sulfur. For many centuries people resorted to Bath to take the waters for medicinal purposes.

5

165

wealth: goodness, health; forth do well: pour forth. 6 fond mischief: foolish destruction; Bladud died trying to fly (“through flight”). 7 Shakespeare’s later version of the story in King Lear (1606) derives some details from Spenser that are not found in any other source, including the manner (though not the timing or circumstances) of Cordelia’s death (see below, 32.9). 8 9

issue: offpsring. utmost date: final day.

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28

The eldest Gonorill gan to protest, That she much more then her owne life him lov’d: And Regan greater love to him profest, Then all the world, when ever it were proov’d;1 But Cordeill said she lov’d him, as behoov’d:2 Whose simple answere, wanting colours3 fayre To paint it forth, him to displeasaunce moov’d, That in his crown he counted her no hayre,4 But twixt the other twain his kingdom whole did shayre.

29

So wedded th’one to Maglan king of Scottes, And thother to the king of Cambria, And twixt them shayrd his realme by equall lottes: But without dowre5 the wise Cordelia, Was sent to Aggannip of Celtica.6 Their aged Syre, thus eased of his crowne, A private life ledd in Albania,7 With Gonorill, long had in great renowne, That nought him griev’d to beene from rule deposed downe.

30

But true it is that when the oyle is spent, The light goes out, and weeke8 is throwne away; So when he had resignd his regiment,9 His daughter gan despise his drouping day,10 And wearie wax of his continuall stay. Tho to his daughter Regan he repayrd, Who him at first well used every way; But when of his departure she despayrd, Her bountie she abated, and his cheare empayrd.11

31

The wretched man gan then avise to late, That love is not, where most it is profest, Too truely tryde in his extremest12 state;

1

proov’d: tested. behoov’d: befitted. 3 colours: rhetorical flourishes. 2

4

hayre: heir. dowre: dowry. 6 Celtica: France; see above, 5.9n. 7 Albania: Scotland, as named above at 14.3. 5

8 weeke: wick (but also suggesting Lear’s weakness). 9 regiment: rule, kingdom. 10 drouping day: fading life. 11 cheare: fare, welcome; empayrd: reduced. 12 extremest: most desperate.

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167

At last resolv’d likewise to prove the rest, He to Cordelia him selfe addrest, Who with entyre affection him receav’d, As for her Syre and king her seemed best; And after all an army strong she leav’d,1 To war on those, which him had of his realme bereav’d. 32

So to his crowne she him restord againe, In which he dyde, made ripe for death by eld, And after wild,2 it should to her remaine: Who peaceably the same long time did weld:3 And all mens harts in dew obedience held: Till that her sisters children, woxen strong, Through proud ambition against her rebeld, And overcommen kept in prison long, Till weary of that wretched life, her selfe she hong.

33

Then gan the bloody brethren both to raine: But fierce Cundah gan shortly to envy His brother Morgan, prickt with proud disdaine, To have a pere in part of soverainty,4 And kindling coles of cruell enmity, Raisd warre, and him in batteill overthrew: Whence as he to those woody hilles did fly, Which hight of him Glamorgan, there him slew: Then did he raigne alone, when he none equall knew.

34

His sonne Rivall’ his dead rowme did supply,5 In whose sad time blood did from heaven rayne: Next great Gurgustus, then faire Caecily, In constant peace their kingdomes did contayne, After whom Lago, and Kinmarke did rayne, And Gorbogud, till far in yeares he grew: Then his Ambitious sonnes unto them twayne, Arraught the rule, and from their father drew,6 Stout Ferrex and sterne Porrex him in prison threw.

1

leav’d: levied. wild: willed. 3 weld: wield, bear. 2

4

I.e., to have an equal in the division of power.

5 his dead rowme did supply: took his place after his death. 6 Arraught: seized; drew: took (the rule).

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35

But O, the greedy thirst of royall crowne, That knowes no kinred,1 nor regardes no right, Stird Porrex up to put his brother downe; Who unto him assembling forreigne might, Made warre on him, and fell him selfe in fight: Whose death t’avenge, his mother mercilesse, Most mercilesse of women, Wyden hight, Her other sonne fast sleeping did oppresse,2 And with most cruell hand him murdred pittilesse.

36

Here ended Brutus sacred progeny, Which had seven hundred yeares this scepter borne, With high renowme, and great felicity; The noble braunch from th’antique stocke3 was torne Through discord, and the roiall throne forlorne: Thenceforth this Realme was into factions rent, Whilest each of Brutus boasted to be borne, That in the end was left no moniment4 Of Brutus, nor of Britons glorie auncient.

37

Then up arose a man of matchlesse might, And wondrous wit to menage high affayres, Who stird with pitty of the stressed plight Of this sad realme, cut into sondry shayres5 By such, as claymd themselves Brutes rightfull hayres, Gathered the Princes of the people loose,6 To taken counsell of their common cares;7 Who with his wisedom won, him streight did choose Their king, and swore him fealty to win or loose.

38

Then made he head8 against his enimies, And Ymner slew, of Logris miscreate;9 Then Ruddoc and proud Stater, both allyes, This of Albany newly nominate,10

1

kinred: kindred. oppresse: take by surprise. 3 stocke: trunk, race. 2

4

moniment: record, reminder. sondry shayres: different portions. 6 Princes: rulers; loose: divided. 5

7

I.e., to consider together the problems they shared. 8 head: headway, incursions. 9 miscreate: illegitimately made king. Logris is England, Albany is Scotland, and Cambry is Wales, as recounted in stanza 14. 10

nominate: named king.

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169

And that of Cambry king confirmed late, He overthrew through his owne valiaunce; Whose countries he redus’d to quiet state, And shortly brought to civile governaunce, Now one, which earst were many, made through variaunce.1 39

Then made he sacred lawes, which some men say Were unto him reveald in vision, By which he freed the Traveilers high way, The Churches part,2 and Ploughmans portion, Restraining stealth,3 and strong extortion; The gratious Numa4 of great Britany: For till his dayes, the chiefe dominion By strength was wielded without pollicy;5 Therefore he first wore crowne of gold for dignity.

40

Donwallo6 dyde (for what may live for ay?) And left two sonnes, of pearelesse prowesse both; That sacked Rome too dearely did assay, The recompence of their perjured oth,7 And ransackt Greece wel tryde,8 when they were wroth; Besides subjected France, and Germany, Which yet their praises speake, all be they loth,9 And inly tremble at the memory Of Brennus and Belinus, kinges of Britany.

41

Next them did Gurgiunt, great Belinus sonne In rule succeede and eke in fathers praise; He Easterland10 subdewd, and Denmarke wonne, And of them both did foy11 and tribute raise, The which was dew in his dead fathers daies: He also gave to fugitives of Spayne,

1

variaunce: disagreement. part: possession, holdings. 3 stealth: secret stealing. 4 Numa: lawgiving king of Rome. 5 pollicy: statesmanship, diplomacy. 6 Only now is the “man of matchlesse might” (37.1) and great unifier of Britain actually named. 2

7

I.e., courage (prowesse) that Rome too sorely tried, and so was sacked, as punishment for breaking its word. 8 tryde: felt, experienced. 9 all be they loth: though unwillingly. 10 Easterland: perhaps Scandinavia (but uncertain). 11

foy: pledge of fealty or allegiance.

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Whom he at sea found wandring from their waies, A seate in Ireland safely to remayne, Which they should hold of him, as subject to Britayne. 42

After him raigned Guitheline his hayre, The justest man and trewest in his daies, Who had to wife Dame Mertia the fayre, A woman worthy of immortall praise, Which for this Realme found many goodly layes,1 And wholesome Statutes to her husband brought: Her many deemd to have beene of the Fayes, As was Aegerie, that Numa tought:2 Those yet of her be Mertian lawes both nam’d and thought.

43

Her sonne Sifillus3 after her did rayne, And then Kimarus, and then Danius; Next whom Morindus did the crowne sustayne, Who, had he not with wrath outrageous, And cruell rancour dim’d his valorous And mightie deedes, should matched have the best: As well in that same field victorious Against the forreine Morands he exprest; Yet lives his memorie, though carcas sleepe in rest.

44

Five sonnes he left begotten of one wife, All which successively by turnes did rayne; First Gorboman a man of vertuous life; Next Archigald, who for his proud disdayne, Deposed was from princedome soverayne, And pitteous4 Elidure put in his sted; Who shortly it to him restord agayne, Till by his death he it recovered; But Peridure and Vigent him disthronized.

45

In wretched prison long he did remaine, Till they outraigned had their utmost date, And then therein reseized5 was againe,

1

found . . . layes: founded laws. Egeria was not one of the fairies (“Fayes”), but a Roman goddess who, according to legend, instructed (“tought”) King Numa (see above, 39.6n.).

2

3

Usually emended to Sisillus, a form closer to the name found in Spenser’s sources. 4 pitteous: pitying, pitiful. 5 reseized: reinstated.

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171

And ruled long with honorable state, Till he surrendred Realme and life to fate. Then all the sonnes of these five brethren raynd By dew successe, and all their Nephewes late,1 Even thrise eleven descents2 the crowne retaynd, Till aged Hely by dew heritage it gaynd. 46

He had two sonnes, whose eldest called Lud Left of his life most famous memory, And endlesse moniments of his great good: And ruin’d wals he did reaedifye3 Of Troynovant,4 gainst force of enimy, And built that gate, which of his name is hight,5 By which he lyes entombed solemnly. He left two sonnes, too young to rule aright, Androgeus and Tenantius, pictures of his might.

47

Whilst they were young, Cassibalane their Eme6 Was by the people chosen in their sted, Who on him tooke the roiall Diademe, And goodly well long time it governed, Till the prowde Romanes him disquieted,7 And warlike Caesar, tempted with the name Of this sweet Island, never conquered, And envying the Britons blazed8 fame, (O hideous hunger of dominion) hether came.

48

Yet twise they were repulsed backe againe, And twise renforst,9 backe to their ships to fly, The whiles with blood they all the shore did staine, And the gray Ocean into purple dy: Ne had they10 footing found at last perdie, Had not Androgeus, false to native soyle,

1

successe: succession; Nephewes late: descendants afterward. 2 descents: generations. 3 reaedifye: rebuild. 4 Troynovant: “new Troy,” a traditional fanciful name for London, supposedly founded by Brutus the Trojan (see above, stanza 9).

5

Ludgate, near St. Paul’s Cathedral. Eme: uncle. 7 disquieted: disturbed. 8 blazed: proclaimed, celebrated. Julius Caesar really did invade Britain, in 54 BC. 6

9

renforst: forced again. had they: would they have.

10

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172

And envious of Uncles soveraintie, Betrayd his countrey unto forreine spoyle:1 Nought els, but treason, from the first this land did foyle.2 49

So by him Caesar got the victory, Through great bloodshed, and many a sad assay,3 In which himselfe was charged heavily4 Of hardy Nennius, whom he yet did slay, But lost his sword, yet to be seene this day. Thenceforth this land was tributarie made T’ambitious Rome, and did their rule obay, Till Arthur all that reckoning defrayd;5 Yet oft the Briton kings against them strongly swayd.6

50

Next him Tenantius raignd, then Kimbeline,7 What time th’eternall Lord in fleshly slime8 Enwombed was, from wretched Adams line To purge away the guilt of sinfull crime: O joyous memorie of happy time, That heavenly grace so plenteously displayd; (O too high ditty for my simple rime.) Soone after this the Romanes him warrayd; For that their tribute he refusd to let be payd.

51

Good Claudius, that next was Emperour, An army brought, and with him batteile fought,9 In which the king was by a Treachetour10 Disguised slaine, ere any thereof thought: Yet ceased not the bloody fight for ought; For Arvirage his brothers place supplyde,

1

spoyle: pillaging, domination. foyle: overthrow, defile. 3 sad assay: hard battle. 4 heavily: mightily. 5 that reckoning defrayd: redeemed that debt of tribute. 2

6

swayd: resisted.

7

Kimbeline, the story of whose defiance of Rome is told at greater length in Shakespeare’s Cymbeline (c. 1610), was king of Britain at the time of the birth of Jesus (lines 2–4). 8

fleshly slime: mortal flesh. The Roman emperor Claudius invaded Britain in AD 43. 10 Treachetour: traitor. 9

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173

Both in his armes, and crowne, and by that draught1 Did drive the Romanes to the weaker syde, That they to peace agreed. So all was pacifyde. 52

Was never king more highly magnifide,2 Nor dredd of Romanes, then was Arvirage, For which the Emperour to him allide His daughter Genuiss’ in marriage: Yet shortly he renounst the vassallage3 Of Rome againe, who hether hastly sent Vespasian, that with great spoile and rage Forwasted4 all, till Genuissa gent Persuaded him to ceasse, and her lord to relent.

53

He dide; and him succeeded Marius, Who joyd5 his dayes in great tranquillity. Then Coyll, and after him good Lucius, That first received Christianity, The sacred pledge of Christes Evangely:6 Yet true it is, that long before that day Hither came Joseph of Arimathy,7 Who brought with him the holy grayle, (they say) And preacht the truth; but since it greatly did decay.

54

This good king shortly without issew dide, Whereof great trouble in the kingdome grew, That did her selfe in sundry parts divide, And with her powre her owne selfe overthrew, Whilest Romanes daily did the weake subdew:

1 draught: device, plot. Arvirage uses the stratagem of dressing in the armor of his brother, the king, until the battle is won. 2

magnifide: praised. vassallage: tribute, subjection. 4 Forwasted: devastated. 5 joyd: enjoyed. 6 Evangely: gospel. 7 Joseph of Arimathea was the disciple who buried Jesus (Matt. 27.57–60). According 3

to later tradition, he brought to England the “holy grayle,” the cup from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper and in which Joseph caught some of Jesus’ blood at the Crucifixion. The quest for the Holy Grail became a central motif in Arthurian legend. In reminding the reader of Joseph (lines 6–9), Spenser “is claiming that Christianity in England, and therefore the English Church, came directly from Jerusalem rather than by way of Rome” (Hamilton).

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Which seeing stout Bunduca,1 up arose, And taking armes, the Britons to her drew; With whom she marched streight against her foes, And them unwares besides the Severne did enclose.2 55

There she with them a cruell batteill tryde, Not with so good successe, as shee deserv’d; By reason that the Captaines on her side, Corrupted by Paulinus, from her swerv’d: Yet such, as were through former flight preserv’d,3 Gathering againe, her Host4 she did renew, And with fresh corage on the victor serv’d:5 But being all defeated, save a few, Rather then fly, or be captiv’d, her selfe she slew.

56

O famous moniment of womens prayse, Matchable either to Semiramis,6 Whom antique history so high doth rayse, Or to Hypsiphil’, or to Thomiris:7 Her Host two hundred thousand numbred is; Who whiles good fortune favoured her might, Triumphed oft against her enimis; And yet though overcome in haplesse fight, Shee triumphed on death, in enemies despight.

57

Her reliques8 Fulgent having gathered, Fought with Severus, and him overthrew; Yet in the chace was slaine of them, that fled: So made them victors, whome he did subdew. Then gan Carausius tirannize anew, And gainst the Romanes bent their proper9 powre,

1

Bunduca, also called Boadicea, queen of the Iceni, led a revolt against the Romans around AD 61; she eventually became a popular subject of poetry and legend. 2 enclose: surround. 3 I.e., yet those who had been saved by fleeing the first time. 4 Host: army. 5 serv’d: advanced, assailed. 6 Semiramis: famous warrior-queen, wife of Ninus (see ix.21.6n.).

7 Hypsiphile was a heroic queen of Lemnos; her story is recounted by Statius, as well as by Chaucer in The Legend of Good Women. Thomiris was the queen of the Massagetae who, according to Herodotus, defeated and killed Cyrus the Great of Persia. 8 reliques: remaining troops. 9 proper: own; Carausius uses the Roman fleet to fight against Rome.

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But him Allectus treacherously slew, And tooke on him the robe of Emperoure: Nath’lesse the same enjoyed but short happy howre: 58

For Asclepiodate him overcame, And left inglorious on the vanquisht playne, Without or robe, or rag, to hide his shame. Then afterwards he in his stead did raigne; But shortly was by Coyll in batteill slaine: Who after long debate, since Lucies1 tyme, Was of the Britons first crownd Soveraine: Then gan this Realme renew her passed prime;2 He of his name Coylchester 3 built of stone and lime.

59

Which when the Romanes heard, they hether sent Constantius, a man of mickle might, With whome king Coyll made an agreement, And to him gave for wife his daughter bright, Faire Helena,4 the fairest living wight; Who in all godly thewes,5 and goodly praise, Did far excell, but was most famous hight6 For skil in Musicke of all in her daies, Aswell in curious instruments as cunning laies.7

60

Of whom he did great Constantine begett, Who afterward was Emperour of Rome; To which whiles absent he his mind did sett,8 Octavius here lept into his roome, And it usurped by unrighteous doome:9 But he his title justifide by might,

1

I.e., Lucius, the Christian king of 53.3, after whose reign the kingdom fell into disorder. 2 passed prime: past glory. 3 Coylchester: Colchester, city northeast of London. 4 St. Helena (c. 250–330) was the mother of the Roman emperor Constantine (next stanza). Spenser pointedly omits her most famous achievement, unearthing the True

Cross, which helped give rise to the importance of relics in the Roman Catholic Church. 5 thewes: virtues, qualities. 6 hight: called, considered. 7 cunning laies: skillful songs. 8 I.e., while Constantine was absent from Britain, occupying himself with Rome. 9

doome: power, authority.

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Slaying Traherne, and having overcome The Romane legion in dreadfull fight: So settled he his kingdome, and confirmd his right. 61

But wanting yssew male, his daughter deare, He gave in wedlocke to Maximian, And him with her made of his kingdome heyre, Who soone by meanes thereof the Empire wan,1 Till murdred by the freends of Gratian, Then gan the Hunnes and Picts2 invade this land, During the raigne of Maximinian;3 Who dying left none heire them to withstand, But that they overran all parts with easy hand.4

62

The weary Britons, whose war-hable5 youth Was by Maximian lately ledd away, With wretched miseryes, and woefull ruth, Were to those Pagans made an open pray, And daily spectacle of sad decay: Whome Romane warres, which now fowr hundred yeares, And more had wasted, could no whit dismay; Til by consent of Commons and of Peares,6 They crownd the second Constantine with joyous teares,

63

Who having oft in batteill vanquished Those spoylefull Picts, and swarming Easterlings,7 Long time in peace his realme established, Yet oft annoyd with sondry bordragings8 Of neighbour Scots, and forrein Scatterlings,9 With which the world did in those dayes abound: Which to outbarre, with painefull pyonings10 From sea to sea he heapt a mighty mound,11 Which from Alcluid to Panwelt did that border bownd.

1

the Empire wan: gained dominion. Hunnes and Picts: tribes from the east and north, respectively. 3 Apparently the same as Maximian (line 2). 4 with easy hand: easily. 5 war-hable: able or ready to wage war. 6 Spenser introduces the two houses of Parliament (Commons and Peers, or Lords) long before their actual establishment. 2

7

Easterlings: tribes from the east; see above, 41.3n. 8 bordragings: invasions, raids across the border. 9 Scatterlings: migrants. 10 painefull pyonings: laborious excavation or entrenchment. 11 This refers not to Hadrian’s Wall but to a later Roman wall farther north, known as

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64

Three sonnes he dying left, all under age; By meanes whereof, their uncle Vortigere Usurpt the crowne, during their pupillage;1 Which th’Infants tutors gathering2 to feare, Them closely into Armorick3 did beare: For dread of whom, and for those Picts annoyes, He sent to Germany, straunge aid to reare,4 From whence eftsoones arrived here three hoyes5 Of Saxons, whom he for his safety imployes.

65

Two brethren were their Capitayns, which hight Hengist and Horsus, well approv’d in warre, And both of them men of renowmed might; Who making vantage6 of their civile jarre, And of those forreyners, which came from farre, Grew great, and got large portions of land, That in the Realme ere long they stronger arre, Then they which sought at first their helping hand, And Vortiger have forst the kingdome to aband.7

66

But by the helpe of Vortimere his sonne, He is againe unto his rule restord, And Hengist seeming sad, for that was donne, Received is to grace and new accord, Through his faire daughters face, and flattring word, Soone after which, three hundred Lords he slew Of British blood, all sitting at his bord;8 Whose dolefull moniments who list9 to rew, Th’eternall marks of treason may at Stonheng vew.10

67

By this the sonnes of Constantine, which fled, Ambrose and Uther did ripe yeares attayne, And here arriving, strongly challenged11

the Antonine Wall, built across Scotland to keep the Picts from moving south. 1 pupillage: period of minority. 2 Infants: princes’; gathering: growing. 3 Armorick: Brittany. 4 straunge: foreign; reare: raise. 5 hoyes: small boats. 6 making vantage: taking advantage.

7

177

aband: abandon, relinquish. bord: table. 9 who list: whoever wishes. 10 Following Holinshed, Spenser explains the famous ring of monoliths at Stonehenge as a monument to the British lords killed by Hengist. 8

11

challenged: claimed, demanded.

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The crowne, which Vortiger did long detayne:1 Who flying from his guilt, by them was slayne, And Hengist eke soone brought to shamefull death. Thenceforth Aurelius 2 peaceably did rayne, Till that through poyson stopped was his breath; So now entombed lies at Stoneheng by the heath. 68

After him Uther, which Pendragon hight, Succeeding There abruptly it did end, Without full point, or other Cesure right,3 As if the rest some wicked hand did rend,4 And th’Author selfe could not at least attend To finish it: that so untimely breach5 The Prince6 him selfe halfe seemed to offend, Yet secret pleasure did offence empeach,7 And wonder of antiquity long stopt his speach.

69

At last quite ravisht with delight, to heare The royall Ofspring of his native land, Cryde out, “Deare countrey, O how dearly deare Ought thy remembraunce, and perpetual band Be to thy foster Childe,8 that from thy hand Did commun breath and nouriture9 receave? How brutish is it not to understand, How much to her we owe, that all us gave, That gave unto us all, what ever good we have.”

70

But Guyon all this while his booke did read, Ne yet has ended: for it was a great And ample volume, that doth far excead My leasure, so long leaves here to repeat:

1

4

2

5

detayne: withhold. Aurelius is called Ambrose in line 2; Spenser’s source, Geoffrey of Monmouth, gives his full name as “Aurelius Ambrosius.” 3

full point: full stop, period; Cesure right: appropriate pause (caesura) or punctuation. Because we have now reached the present (Uther Pendragon was Arthur’s father), the history ends.

rend: tear away. breach: breaking off. 6 I.e., Arthur. 7 empeach: hinder, prevent. 8

Arthur knows he is British but is unsure of his exact parentage because he was taken away as an infant and reared as a “foster Childe.” 9

nouriture: nurture, sustenance.

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179

It told, how first Prometheus1 did create A man, of many parts from beasts deryv’d, And then stole fire from heven, to animate His worke, for which he was by Jove depryv’d Of life him self, and hart-strings of an Aegle ryv’d.2 71

That man so made, he called Elfe, to weet3 Quick, the first author4 of all Elfin kynd: Who wandring through the world with wearie feet, Did in the gardins of Adonis5 fynd A goodly creature, whom he deemd in mynd To be no earthly wight, but either Spright, Or Angell, th’authour of all woman kynd; Therefore a Fay he her according6 hight, Of whom all Faryes spring, and fetch their lignage right.

72

Of these a mighty people shortly grew, And puissant kinges, which all the world warrayd, And to them selves all Nations did subdew: The first and eldest, which that scepter swayd, Was Elfin; him all India obayd, And all that now America men call: Next him was noble Elfinan, who laid Cleopolis7 foundation first of all: But Elfiline enclosd it with a golden wall.

73

His sonne was Elfinell, who overcame The wicked Gobbelines in bloody field: But Elfant was of most renowmed fame, Who all of Christall did Panthea build: Then Elfar, who two brethren gyauntes kild, The one of which had two heades, th’other three:

1

In Greek mythology, Prometheus was told by Zeus to create humans out of clay. Pitying them, he gave them fire, or the spark of life, in punishment for which Zeus chained him to a mountain, where an eagle perpetually feasted on his liver (changed by Spenser to his “hart-strings” in line 9). 2

ryv’d: torn. Since Prometheus is immortal, he is “depryv’d Of life” in the sense of being eternally imprisoned.

3

to weet: to wit, in other words. Quick: alive; author: ancestor. Spenser’s interpretation of “elf ” is original. 5 The “gardins of Adonis” are described in III.vi. 6 according: accordingly, appropriately. 7 Cleopolis: capital of Faerie Land, seat of Gloriana. 4

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Then Elfinor, who was in magick skild; He built by art upon the glassy See A bridge of bras, whose sound hevens thunder seem’d to bee. 74

He left three sonnes, the which in order raynd, And all their Ofspring, in their dew descents,1 Even seven hundred Princes, which maintaynd With mightie deedes their sondry governments; That were too long their infinite contents2 Here to record, ne much materiall:3 Yet should they be most famous moniments, And brave ensample, both of martiall, And civil rule to kinges and states imperiall.

75

After all these Elficleos did rayne,4 The wise Elficleos in great Majestie, Who mightily that scepter did sustayne, And with rich spoyles and famous victorie, Did high advaunce the crowne of Faery: He left two sonnes, of which faire Elferon The eldest brother did untimely dy; Whose emptie place the mightie Oberon Doubly supplide, in spousall, and dominion.5

76

Great was his power and glorie over all, Which him before, that sacred seate did fill, That yet remaines his wide memoriall:6 He dying left the fairest Tanaquill,7 Him to succeede therein, by his last will:

1

descents: succession. contents: histories. 3 ne much materiall: nor much to the purpose. 4 Elficleos represents Elizabeth’s grandfather, Henry VII (ruled 1485–1509), first king of the Tudor dynasty. 2

5

Oberon is Henry VIII, Elizabeth’s father (ruled 1509–1547). Henry’s older brother Arthur (Elferon) died before coming to the throne; thereupon Henry married his widow, Catherine of Aragon, thus filling

his brother’s place “in spousall, and dominion.” 6 his wide memoriall: his memory far and wide. 7 “Tanaquill” is given at I.Pr.2.5 as another name for the Faerie Queen; in terms of English history, she represents Elizabeth. The elfin history omits Elizabeth’s two siblings, Edward and Mary, both of whom reigned between her father’s death and her accession in 1558.

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Fairer and nobler liveth none this howre, Ne like in grace, ne like in learned skill; Therefore they Glorian call that glorious flowre, Long mayst thou Glorian live, in glory and great powre. 77

1

Beguyld thus with delight of novelties, And naturall desire1 of countryes state, So long they redd in those antiquities, That how the time was fled, they quite forgate, Till gentle Alma seeing it so late, Perforce their studies broke, and them besought To thinke, how supper did them long awaite. So halfe unwilling from their bookes them brought, And fayrely feasted, as so noble knightes she ought.

desire: love, wish to learn.

181

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Canto Eleven The enimies of Temperaunce besiege her dwelling place: Prince Arthure them repelles, and fowle Maleger doth deface.1

1

What warre so cruel, or what siege so sore, As that, which strong affections2 doe apply Against the forte of reason evermore, To bring the sowle into captivity: Their force is fiercer through infirmity Of the fraile flesh, relenting to their rage, And exercise most bitter tyranny Upon the partes, brought into their bondage: No wretchednesse is like to sinfull vellenage.3

2

But in a body which doth freely yeeld His partes to reasons rule obedient, And letteth her that ought the scepter weeld, All happy peace and goodly government Is setled there in sure establishment, There Alma like a virgin Queene most bright, Doth florish in all beautie excellent: And to her guestes doth bounteous banket4 dight, Attempred5 goodly well for health and for delight.

3

Early before the Morne with cremosin6 ray, The windowes of bright heaven opened had, Through which into the world the dawning day Might looke, that maketh every creature glad, Uprose Sir Guyon, in bright armour clad,

1

deface: overcome. Maleger means both “terribly sick” (Latin male, badly, and aeger, ill) and “bearer of evil” (Latin gero, bearer). He thus represents disease and also, more generally, any evil that afflicts the bodily senses.

2

affections: passions. sinfull vellenage: enslavement to sin. 4 banket: banquet. 5 Attempred: balanced, ordered. 6 cremosin: crimson. 3

182

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183

And to his purposd journey him prepar’d: With him the Palmer eke in habit sad,1 Him selfe addrest to that adventure hard: So to the rivers syde they both together far’d. 4

Where them awaited ready at the ford The Ferriman, as Alma had behight,2 With his well rigged bote: They goe abord, And he eftsoones gan launch his barke forthright. Ere long they rowed were quite out of sight, And fast the land behynd them fled away. But let them pas, whiles winde and wether right Doe serve their turnes: here I a while must stay, To see a cruell fight doen by the prince this day.

5

For all so soone, as Guyon thence was gon Upon his voyage with his trustie guyde, That wicked band of villeins fresh begon That castle to assaile on every side, And lay strong siege about it far and wyde. So huge and infinite their numbers were, That all the land they under them did hyde; So fowle and ugly, that exceeding feare Their visages imprest,3 when they approched neare.

6

Them in twelve troupes their Captein did dispart4 And round about in fittest steades did place, Where each might best offend his proper part, And his contrary object most deface, As every one seem’d meetest5 in that cace. Seven of the same against the Castle gate, In strong entrenchments he did closely place, Which with incessaunt force and endlesse hate, They battred day and night, and entraunce did awate.

1

habit sad: sober garment. behight: ordered. 3 Their visages imprest: their aspects compelled (exceeding fear in the beholder). 2

4 dispart: divide. Seven of the twelve troops, representing the seven deadly sins, attack together (line 6), while each of the remaining troops besieges one of the five senses (stanzas 7–13). 5 meetest: fittest.

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7

The other five, five sondry wayes he sett, Against the five great Bulwarkes of that pyle,1 And unto each a Bulwarke did arrett,2 T’assayle with open force or hidden guyle, In hope thereof to win victorious spoile. They all that charge did fervently apply, With greedie malice and importune3 toyle, And planted there their huge artillery, With which they dayly made most dreadfull battery.

8

The first troupe was a monstrous rablement4 Of fowle misshapen wightes, of which some were Headed like Owles, with beckes uncomely5 bent, Others like Dogs, others like Gryphons dreare,6 And some had wings, and some had clawes to teare, And every one of them had Lynces7 eyes, And every one did bow and arrowes beare: All those were lawlesse lustes, corrupt envyes, And covetous aspects,8 all cruel enimyes.

9

Those same against the bulwarke of the Sight Did lay strong siege, and battailous assault, Ne once did yield it respitt day nor night, But soone as Titan gan his head exault,9 And soone againe as he his light withhault,10 Their wicked engins they against it bent: That is each thing, by which the eyes may fault,11 But two then all more huge and violent, Beautie, and money they against that Bulwarke lent.12

10

The second Bulwarke was the Hearing sence, Gainst which the second troupe assignment13 makes, Deformed creatures, in straunge difference,14

1

Bulwarkes: fortifications; pyle: castle. arrett: assign. 3 importune: incessant, irksome. 4 rablement: rabble, crowd. 5 beckes: beaks; uncomely: unattractively. 6 dreare: frightful. Gryphons are fabled creatures, part eagle, part lion. 2

7 Both the lynx and the Greek hero Lynceus were famous for their keen eyesight. 8 aspects: looks. 9 Titan: the sun; exault: raise. 10 withhault: withheld. 11 fault: sin. 12 lent: turned, pressed. 13 assignment: concerted attack. 14 I.e., variety, difference from each other.

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Some having heads like Harts,1 some like to Snakes, Some like wilde Bores late rouzd out of the brakes,2 Slaunderous reproches, and fowle infamies, Leasinges, backbytinges, and vaineglorious crakes,3 Bad counsels, prayses, and false flatteries, All those against that fort did bend their batteries. 11

Likewise that same third Fort, that is the Smell Of that third troupe was cruelly assayd:4 Whose hideous shapes were like to feendes of hell, Some like to houndes, some like to Apes, dismayd,5 Some like to Puttockes,6 all in plumes arayd: All shap’t according their conditions, For by those ugly formes weren pourtrayd, Foolish delights and fond abusions,7 Which doe that sence besiege with light illusions.

12

And that fourth band which cruell battry bent, Against the fourth Bulwarke, that is the Taste, Was as the rest a grysie8 rablement, Some mouth’d like greedy Oystriges, some faste9 Like loathly Toades, some fashioned in the waste10 Like swine; for so deformd is luxury,11 Surfeat, misdiet, and unthriftie waste, Vaine feastes, and ydle superfluity: All those this sences Fort assayle incessantly.

13

But the fift troupe most horrible of hew, And ferce of force, is dreadfull to report: For some like Snailes, some did like spyders shew, And some like ugly Urchins12 thick and short: Cruelly they assayed that fift Fort, Armed with dartes of sensuall delight,

1

Harts: deer. brakes: bushes.

8

3

grysie: grisly, horrible. Oystriges: ostriches (considered to be ravenous); faste: faced, i.e., having faces.

4

10

2

Leasinges: lies; crakes: boasts. assayd: tried, assailed. 5 dismayd: ill-made, misshapen. 6 Puttockes: buzzards, birds of prey. 7

abusions: delusions.

9

waste: waist, belly. luxury: sensual excess. 12 Urchins: hedgehogs. 11

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With stinges of carnall lust, and strong effort1 Of feeling pleasures,2 with which day and night Against that same fift bulwarke they continued fight. 14

Thus these twelve troupes with dreadfull puissaunce Against that Castle restlesse siege did lay, And evermore their hideous Ordinaunce3 Upon the Bulwarkes cruelly did play, That now it gan to threaten neare decay. And evermore their wicked Capitayn Provoked them the breaches to assay,4 Somtimes with threats, somtimes with hope of gayn, Which by the ransack of that peece5 they should attayn.

15

On th’other syde, th’assieged Castles ward6 Their stedfast stonds7 did mightily maintaine, And many bold repulse, and many hard Atchievement wrought with perill and with payne, That goodly frame8 from ruine to sustaine: And those two brethren Gyauntes9 did defend The walles so stoutly with their sturdie mayne,10 That never entraunce any durst pretend,11 But they to direfull death their groning ghosts did send.

16

The noble Virgin, Ladie of the Place, Was much dismayed with that dreadful sight: For never was she in so evill cace,12 Till that the Prince seeing her wofull plight, Gan her recomfort from so sad affright, Offring his service, and his dearest life For her defence, against that Carle13 to fight, Which was their chiefe and th’authour14 of that strife: She him remercied15 as the Patrone of her life.

1

8

2

9

effort: force. feeling pleasures: pleasures of touch. 3 Ordinaunce: artillery. 4 breaches to assay: to invade openings in the wall. 5 peece: fortress. 6 assieged: besieged; ward: guard, garrison. 7 stonds: stands, posts.

frame: structure. I.e., the hands. 10 mayne: strength, with pun on French main, hand. 11 pretend: attempt. 12 evill cace: bad situation. 13 Carle: churl, villain. 14 th’authour: the originator. 15 remercied: thanked.

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17

Eftsoones himselfe in glitterand1 armes he dight, And his well proved weapons to him hent; So taking courteous conge he behight,2 Those gates to be unbar’d, and forth he went. Fayre mote he thee, the prowest3 and most gent, That ever brandished bright steele on hye: Whom soone as that unruly rablement, With his gay Squyre issewing did espye, They reard a most outrageous dreadfull yelling cry.

18

And therewithall attonce at him let fly Their fluttring arrowes, thicke as flakes of snow, And round about him flocke impetuously, Like a great water flood, that tombling low From the high mountaines, threates to overflow With suddein fury all the fertile playne, And the sad husbandmans long hope4 doth throw, A downe the streame and all his vowes make vayne, Nor bounds nor banks his headlong ruine5 may sustayne.

19

Upon his shield their heaped hayle6 he bore, And with his sword disperst the raskall flockes, Which fled a sonder, and him fell before, As withered leaves drop from their dryed stockes, When the wroth Western wind does reave their locks;7 And under neath him his courageous steed, The fierce Spumador trode them downe like docks,8 The fierce Spudamor borne of heavenly seed: Such as Laomedon of Phoebus race did breed.9

1

glitterand: glittering. behight: ordered. 3 thee: thrive, prosper; prowest: bravest, most valiant. 4 husbandmans long hope: farmer’s long-expected crop. 5 ruine: course, descent, destruction. The comparison of troops to a flood of water occurs repeatedly in Homer and Virgil, e.g., Aeneid, 2.305–8. 2

187

6

heaped hayle: thick storm (of arrows). reave their locks: tear out their hair (the leaves being like the curled hair of the “stockes” or branches). 7

8

docks: weeds. The name of Arthur’s horse, Spumador, means “foaming” or “frothing.” 9 Laomedon was a king of Troy to whom Zeus (not Phoebus) was said to have given an immortal breed of horses.

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20

Which suddeine horrour and confused cry, When as their Capteine heard, in haste he yode,1 The cause to weet, and fault to remedy, Upon a Tygre swift and fierce he rode, That as the winde ran underneath his lode, Whiles his long legs nigh raught2 unto the ground, Full large he was of limbe, and shoulders brode, But of such subtile substance and unsound,3 That like a ghost he seem’d, whose grave-clothes were unbound.

21

And in his hand a bended bow was seene, And many arrowes under his right side, All deadly daungerous, all cruell keene, Headed with flint, and fethers bloody dide, Such as the Indians in their quivers hide, Those could he well direct and streight as line, And bid them strike the marke, which he had eyde, Ne was their salve ne was their medicine, That mote recure their wounds: so inly they did tine.4

22

As pale and wan as ashes was his looke, His body leane and meagre as a rake, And skin all withered like a dryed rooke,5 Thereto as cold and drery6 as a Snake, That seemd to tremble evermore, and quake: All in a canvas thin he was bedight, And girded with a belt of twisted brake,7 Upon his head he wore an Helmet light, Made of a dead mans skull, that seemd a ghastly sight.

23

Maleger 8 was his name, and after him, There follow’d fast at hand two wicked Hags, With hoary9 lockes all loose, and visage grim; Their feet unshod, their bodies wrapt in rags, And both as swift on foot, as chased Stags, And yet the one her other legge10 had lame,

1

6

2

7

yode: went. nigh raught: nearly reached. 3 subtile: immaterial; unsound: infirm. 4 inly: inwardly, deeply; tine: hurt. 5 rooke: ruck, pile of hay.

Thereto: in addition; drery: dismal. brake: bramble. 8 See above, Arg.4n. 9

hoary: gray. I.e., one of her legs; cf. iv.4.3.

10

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Which with a staffe, all full of litle snags She did support, and Impotence her name: But th’other was Impatience, arm’d with raging flame. 24

Soone as the Carle from far the Prince espyde, Glistring in armes and warlike ornament, His Beast he felly prickt on either syde, And his mischievous1 bow full readie bent, With which at him a cruell shaft he sent: But he was warie, and it warded well Upon his shield, that it no further went, But to the ground the idle quarrell2 fell: Then he another and another did expell.3

25

Which to prevent, the Prince his mortall4 speare Soone to him raught, and fierce at him did ride, To be avenged of that shot whyleare: But he was not so hardy to abide That bitter stownd,5 but turning quicke aside His light-foot beast, fled fast away for feare: Whom to poursue, the Infant after hide,6 So fast as his good Courser could him beare, But labour lost it was, to weene approch him neare.

26

For as the winged wind his Tigre fled, That vew of eye could scarse him overtake, Ne scarse his feet on ground were seene to tred; Through hils and dales he speedy way did make, Ne hedge ne ditch his readie passage brake,7 And in his flight the villein turn’d his face, (As wonts the Tartar by the Caspian lake, When as the Russian him in fight does chace) Unto his Tygres taile, and shot at him apace.8

1

mischievous: harmful. idle: vain; quarrell: bolt, arrow. 3 expell: shoot. 4 mortall: fatal, death-dealing. 5 bitter stownd: fierce attack. 2

6

Infant: prince; hide: hied, went. brake: interrupted. 8 apace: swiftly. Marco Polo, among others, reported that the Tartars, like the ancient Parthians, fought by shooting in retreat. 7

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27

Apace he shot, and yet he fled apace, Still as the greedy knight nigh to him drew, And oftentimes he would relent1 his pace, That him his foe more fiercely should poursew: But when his uncouth manner he did vew, He gan avize to follow him no more, But keepe his standing, and his shaftes eschew,2 Untill he quite had spent his perlous3 store, And then assayle him fresh, ere he could shift4 for more.

28

But that lame Hag, still as abroad he strew His wicked arrowes, gathered them againe, And to him brought fresh batteill to renew: Which he espying, cast5 her to restraine From yielding succour to that cursed Swaine, And her attaching,6 thought her hands to tye; But soone as him dismounted on the plaine, That other Hag did far away espye Binding her sister, she to him ran hastily.

29

And catching hold of him, as downe he lent, Him backeward overthrew, and downe him stayd7 With their rude handes and gryesly graplement,8 Till that the villein comming to their ayd, Upon him fell, and lode upon him layd; Full litle wanted, but he had him slaine,9 And of the battell balefull10 end had made, Had not his gentle Squire beheld his paine, And commen to his reskew, ere his bitter bane.11

30

So greatest and most glorious thing on ground May often need the helpe of weaker hand; So feeble is mans state, and life unsound,12

1

8

2

9

relent: slow. his shaftes eschew: avoid his arrows. 3 perlous: perilous. 4 shift: provide, go. 5 cast: determined, contrived. 6 attaching: seizing. 7 stayd: held.

gryesly graplement: horrible grasp. I.e., very little was lacking for the “villein” (Maleger) to have slain him. 10 balefull: grievous. 11 bane: death. 12 unsound: uncertain.

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That in assuraunce it may never stand, Till it dissolved be from earthly band. Proofe be thou Prince, the prowest man alyve, And noblest borne of all in Britayne land, Yet thee fierce Fortune did so nearely drive,1 That had not grace thee blest, thou shouldest not survive. 31

The Squyre arriving, fiercely in his armes Snatcht first the one, and then the other Jade,2 His chiefest letts3 and authors of his harmes, And them perforce withheld with threatned blade, Least that his Lord they should behinde invade;4 The whiles the Prince prickt with reprochful shame, As one awakte out of long slombring shade, Reviving thought of glory and of fame, United all his powres to purge himselfe from blame.

32

Like as a fire, the which in hollow cave Hath long bene underkept,5 and down supprest, With murmurous disdayne doth inly rave, And grudge, in so streight6 prison to be prest, At last breakes forth with furious infest,7 And strives to mount unto his native seat;8 All that did earst it hinder and molest,9 Yt now devoures with flames and scorching heat, And carries into smoake with rage and horror great.

33

So mightily the Briton Prince him rouzd Out of his holde, and broke his caytive bands, And as a Beare whom angry curres have touzd,10 Having off-shakt them, and escapt their hands,11 Becomes more fell, and all that him withstands

1 2

nearely drive: push to the limit.

Jade: shameless woman. 3 letts: hindrances. 4 invade: attack. 5 underkept: stifled. 6 grudge: grumble, resent; streight: narrow. 7 infest: hostility.

8

Fire, being the lightest of the four elements, is native to the highest sphere, i.e., the sky.

9

molest: harm. touzd: worried, harried. The sport of bear-baiting, in which dogs (“curres”) were made to attack a chained bear, was popular with Elizabethan spectators. 10

11

I.e., their grip.

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Treads down and overthrowes. Now had the Carle Alighted from his Tigre, and his hands Discharged of his bow and deadly quar’le,1 To seize upon his foe flatt lying on the marle.2 34

Which now him turnd to disavantage deare,3 For neither can he fly, nor other harme,4 But trust unto his strength and manhood meare,5 Sith now he is far from his monstrous swarme, And of his weapons did him selfe disarme. The knight yet wrothfull for his late disgrace, Fiercely advaunst his valorous right arme, And him so sore smott with his yron mace, That groveling6 to the ground he fell, and fild his place.

35

Wel weened hee, that field was then his owne, And all his labor brought to happy end, When suddein up the villeine overthrowne, Out of his swowne7 arose, fresh to contend, And gan him selfe to second battaill bend,8 As hurt he had not beene. Thereby there lay An huge great stone, which stood upon one end, And had not bene removed many a day; Some land-marke seemd to bee, or signe of sundry way.9

36

The same he snatcht, and with exceeding sway Threw at his foe, who was right well aware To shonne the engin of his meant decay; It booted not to thinke that throw to beare, But grownd he gave, and lightly lept areare: Efte fierce retourning, as a faulcon fayre That once hath failed of her souse10 full neare, Remounts againe into the open ayre, And unto better fortune doth her selfe prepayre.

1

Discharged: rid, emptied; quar’le: quarrel, arrow. 2 marle: earth, dirt. 3 deare: costly. 4 other harme: harm the other, do other harm. 5 meare: only. 6 groveling: face down, prone.

7

swowne: swoon, daze. bend: apply, exert. 9 sundry way: crossroads. The throwing of enormous boulders is typical of Homeric and Virgilian warriors, especially when disarmed. 10 souse: swoop, a technical term from falconry. 8

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So brave retourning, with his brandisht blade,1 He to the Carle him selfe agayn addrest, And strooke at him so sternely, that he made An open passage through his riven brest, That halfe the steele behind his backe did rest; Which drawing backe, he looked evermore When the hart blood should gush out of his chest, Or his dead corse should fall upon the flore; But his dead corse upon the flore fell nathemore.2

38

Ne drop of blood appeared shed to bee, All3 were the wownd so wide and wonderous, That through his carcas one might playnly see: Halfe in amaze with horror hideous, And halfe in rage, to be deluded thus, Again through both the sides he strooke him quight, That made his spright to grone full piteous: Yet nathemore forth fled his groning spright, But freshly as at first, prepard himselfe to fight.

39

Thereat he smitten was with great affright, And trembling terror did his hart apall, Ne wist he, what to thinke of that same sight, Ne what to say, ne what to doe at all; He doubted, least it were some magicall Illusion, that did beguile his sense, Or wandring ghost, that wanted funerall,4 Or aery spirite under false pretence,5 Or hellish feend raysd up through divelish science.6

40

His wonder far exceeded reasons reach, That he began to doubt his dazeled sight, And oft of error did him selfe appeach:7 Flesh without blood, a person without spright, Wounds without hurt, a body without might, That could doe harme, yet could not harmed bee,

1

I.e., brandishing or shaking his sword. nathemore: not, not the more (for being wounded).

5

2

6

3

7

All: although. wanted funerall: lacked burial (and therefore continued to wander the earth). 4

193

pretence: disguise. divelish science: evil knowledge, witchcraft. appeach: accuse.

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That could not die, yet seemd a mortall wight, That was most strong in most infirmitee; Like did he never heare, like did he never see. 41

A while he stood in this astonishment, Yet would he not for all his great dismay Give over1 to effect his first intent, And th’utmost meanes of victory assay, Or th’utmost yssew2 of his owne decay. His owne good sword Mordure,3 that never fayld At need, till now, he lightly threw away, And his bright shield, that nought him now avayld, And with his naked hands him forcibly assayld.

42

Twixt his two mighty armes him up he snatcht, And crusht his carcas4 so against his brest, That the disdainfull sowle he thence dispatcht, And th’ydle breath all utterly exprest:5 Tho when he felt him dead, adowne he kest The lumpish6 corse unto the sencelesse grownd, Adowne he kest it with so puissant wrest,7 That backe againe it did alofte rebownd, And gave against his mother earth a gronefull sownd.

43

As when Joves harnesse-bearing Bird8 from hye Stoupes9 at a flying heron with proud disdayne, The stone-dead quarrey10 falls so forciblye, That yt rebownds against the lowly playne, A second fall redoubling backe agayne. Then thought the Prince all peril sure was past,

1

Give over: cease, give up. yssew: result, outcome. 3 See viii.21.6 and n. 4 carcas: body. 5 exprest: pressed out. 6 lumpish: heavy, cumbersome. 7 wrest: heave. 8 Jove’s bird is the eagle. Virgil refers to the eagle as “Jove’s arms-bearer” (Aeneid, 5.255 and 9.564) because it holds his thunderbolts 2

in its claws, and this may explain “harnessebearing” (though “harness” usually means “armor,” not “weapons”). But the imagery of the stanza suggests rather that Jove (Jupiter) is using the eagle as a hunting bird, in which case it would be equipped with gear or “harness.” 9 Stoupes: swoops; like “quarrey” (below), a term from falconry. 10 quarrey: a bird hunted by a trained hawk or falcon.

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And that he victor onely did remayne; No sooner thought, then that the Carle as fast Gan heap huge strokes on him, as ere he down was cast. 44

Nigh his wits end then woxe th’amazed knight, And thought his labor lost and travell1 vayne, Against this lifelesse shadow so to fight: Yet life he saw, and felt his mighty mayne,2 That whiles he marveild still, did still him payne: For thy he gan some other wayes advize, How to take life from that dead-living swayne,3 Whom still he marked freshly to arize From th’earth, and from her womb new spirits to reprize.4

45

He then remembred well, that had bene sayd, How th’Earth his mother was, and first him bore, Shee eke so often, as his life decayd, Did life with usury5 to him restore, And raysd him up much stronger then before, So soone as he unto her wombe did fall; Therefore to grownd he would him cast no more, Ne him committ to grave terrestriall, But beare him farre from hope of succour usuall.

46

Tho up he caught him twixt his puissant hands, And having scruzd6 out of his carrion corse The lothfull7 life, now loosd from sinfull bands, Upon his shoulders carried him perforse Above three furlongs,8 taking his full course, Untill he came unto a standing lake; Him thereinto he threw without remorse, Ne stird, till hope of life did him forsake;9 So end of that Carles dayes, and his owne paynes did make.

1

travell: effort. mayne: strength. 3 swayne: person. 4 reprize: take, receive back. 5 usury: interest, surplus. Maleger’s gaining life from his mother earth imitates the classical myth of Antaeus, who was eventually 2

killed by Hercules using the same method adopted here by Arthur. 6

scruzd: squeezed. lothfull: loathsome, loath (to die). 8 About half a mile in all. 9 I.e., and did not move until all possibility that he might still live was gone. 7

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Which when those wicked Hags from far did spye, Like two mad dogs they ran about the lands, And th’one of them with dreadfull yelling crye, Throwing away her broken chaines and bands, And having quencht her burning fier brands, Hedlong her selfe did cast into that lake; But Impotence with her owne wilfull hands, One of Malegers cursed darts did take, So ryv’d1 her trembling hart, and wicked end did make.

48

Thus now alone he conquerour remaines; Tho cumming to his Squyre, that kept his steed, Thought to have mounted, but his feeble vaines Him faild thereto, and served not his need, Through losse of blood, which from his wounds did bleed, That he began to faint, and life decay: But his good Squyre him helping up with speed, With stedfast hand upon his horse did stay,2 And led him to the Castle by the beaten way.

49

Where many Groomes and Squyres ready were, To take him from his steed full tenderly, And eke the fayrest Alma mett him there With balme and wine and costly spicery, To comfort him in his infirmity; Eftsoones shee causd him up to be convayd, And of his armes despoyled easily,3 In sumptuous bed shee made him to be layd, And al the while his wounds were dressing, by him stayd.

1 2

ryv’d: pierced. stay: support.

3

despoyled easily: gently divested.

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Canto Twelve Guyon through Palmers governaunce, through passing perilles great, Doth overthrow the Bowre of blis, and Acrasy defeat.1

1

Now ginnes this goodly frame2 of Temperaunce Fayrely to rise, and her adorned hed To pricke3 of highest prayse forth to advaunce, Formerly4 grounded, and fast setteled On firme foundation of true bountyhed;5 And that brave knight, that for this vertue fightes, Now comes to point6 of that same perilous sted, Where Pleasure dwelles in sensuall delights, Mongst thousand dangers, and ten thousand Magick mights.

2

Two dayes now in that sea he sayled has, Ne ever land beheld, ne living wight, Ne ought save perill, still as he did pas: Tho when appeared the third Morrow7 bright, Upon the waves to spred her trembling light, An hideous roring far away they heard, That all their sences filled with affright, And streight they saw the raging surges reard Up to the skyes, that them of drowning made affeard.

1 On Acrasia (“Acrasy”), see i.51.2n. On the Bower of Bliss, and on the sources for Guyon’s adventures in this canto, see Introduction, Sections 1 and 3. 2 frame: structure, building. This may refer to the good ordering of Temperance itself, or it may refer to Book Two, the wellstructured “Legend . . . Of Temperaunce,” now reaching its climax. 3 pricke: point, pinnacle.

4

Formerly: having already been. bountyhed: charity. 6 point: the very place, center. 7 Morrow: morning. A highly symbolic period of time: compare Jonah, who spent three days floating in the belly of the fish and is therefore invoked as a type by Jesus, who likewise rose on the third day (Matt. 12.40). 5

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3

Said then the Boteman, “Palmer stere aright, And keepe an even course; for yonder way We needes must pas (God doe us well acquight,)1 That is the Gulfe of Greedinesse, they say, That deepe engorgeth2 all this worldes pray: Which having swallowd up excessively, He soone in vomit up againe doth lay,3 And belcheth forth his superfluity, That all the seas for feare doe seeme away to fly.

4

“On thother syde an hideous Rock is pight,4 Of mightie Magnes stone, whose craggie clift5 Depending6 from on high, dreadfull to sight, Over the waves his rugged armes doth lift, And threatneth downe to throw his ragged rift,7 On whoso cometh nigh; yet nigh it drawes All passengers, that none from it can shift:8 For whiles they fly that Gulfes devouring jawes, They on this Rock are rent, and sunck in helples wawes.”9

5

Forward they passe, and strongly he them rowes, Untill they nigh unto that Gulfe arryve, Where streame10 more violent and greedy growes: Then he with all his puisaunce doth stryve To strike his oares, and mightily doth dryve The hollow vessell through the threatfull wave, Which gaping wide, to swallow them alyve, In th’huge abysse of his engulfing grave, Doth rore at them in vaine, and with great terrour rave.

6

They passing by, that grisely mouth did see, Sucking the seas into his entralles deepe, That seemd more horrible then hell to bee,

1

acquight: deliver. engorgeth: swallows. 3 lay: spew, send forth. 4 pight: placed. 5 Magnes: magnet; clift: cliff. 6 Depending: overhanging. 7 rift: crag, boulders. 8 shift: escape. 2

9 wawes: waves. The “Rock of vile Reproch” (named in stanza 8) and the “Gulfe of Greedinesse” are very closely based on classical accounts of Scylla and Charybdis, the monster and whirlpool between which both Odysseus and Aeneas had to pass (Odyssey, 12.73–259 and Aeneid, 3.554–69). 10 streame: current.

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Or that darke dreadfull hole of Tartare1 steepe, Through which the damned ghosts doen often creep Backe to the world, bad livers to torment: But nought that falles into this direfull deepe, Ne that approcheth nigh the wyde descent, May backe retourne, but is condemned to be drent.2 7

On thother side, they saw that perilous Rocke, Threatning it selfe on them to ruinate,3 On whose sharp cliftes the ribs of vessels broke, And shivered ships, which had beene wrecked late, Yet stuck, with carcases exanimate4 Of such, as having all their substance spent In wanton joyes, and lustes intemperate, Did afterwardes make shipwrack violent, Both of their life, and fame for ever fowly blent.5

8

For thy this hight The Rock of vile Reproch, A daungerous and detestable place, To which nor fish nor fowle did once approch, But yelling Meawes,6 with Seagulles hoars and bace, And Cormoyraunts,7 with birds of ravenous race, Which still sat wayting on that wastfull clift, For spoile of wretches, whose unhappy cace, After lost credit and consumed thrift, At last them driven hath to this despairefull drift.8

9

The Palmer seeing them in safetie past, Thus saide, “Behold th’ensamples in our sightes, Of lustfull luxurie and thriftlesse wast: What now is left of miserable wightes, Which spent their looser daies in leud delightes, But shame and sad reproch, here to be red,9

1

Tartare: region of the underworld where malefactors are punished. Several places were reputed sites of a “dreadfull hole” permitting passage between earth and Hades. 2

drent: drowned. ruinate: tumble, destroy. 4 exanimate: lacking a soul (i.e., dead, but also, allegorically, soulless). 3

5

blent: defrauded, sullied. Meawes: sea-mews, a type of gull. 7 Cormorants are traditionally voracious. 8 drift: drifting, course. 9 red: known, considered. 6

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By these rent reliques,1 speaking their ill plightes? Let all that live, hereby be counselled, To shunne Rock of Reproch and it as death to dread.” 10

So forth they rowed, and that Ferryman With his stiffe oares did brush the sea so strong, That the hoare waters from his frigot2 ran, And the light bubles daunced all along, Whiles the salt brine out of the billowes sprong. At last far off they many Islandes spy, On every side floting the floodes emong: Then said the knight, “Lo I the land descry, Therefore old Syre thy course doe thereunto apply.”

11

“That may not bee,” said then the Ferryman “Least wee unweeting hap to be fordonne:3 For those same Islands, seeming4 now and than, Are not firme land, nor any certein wonne, But stragling plots, which to and fro doe ronne In the wide waters: therefore are they hight The wandring Islands. Therefore doe them shonne; For they have ofte drawne many a wandring wight Into most deadly daunger and distressed plight.

12

“Yet well they seeme to him, that farre doth vew, Both faire and fruitfull, and the grownd dispred,5 With grassy greene of delectable hew, And the tall trees with leaves appareled, Are deckt with blossoms dyde in white and red, That mote the passengers6 thereto allure; But whosoever once hath fastened His foot thereon, may never it recure, But wandreth ever more uncertein and unsure.

13

“As th’Isle of Delos whylome men report Amid th’Aegaean sea long time did stray, Ne made for shipping any certeine port,

1

4

2

5

rent reliques: broken remains. hoare: white (with churning); frigot: boat. 3 unweeting: unwittingly, carelessly; fordonne: destroyed.

seeming: appearing. dispred: spread over. 6 passengers: travelers, passersby.

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Till that Latona traveiling1 that way, Flying from Junoes wrath and hard assay, Of her fayre twins was there delivered, Which afterwards did rule the night and day; Thenceforth it firmely was established, And for Apolloes temple highly herried.”2 14

They to him hearken, as beseemeth meete, And passe on forward: so their way does ly, That one of those same Islands, which doe fleet3 In the wide sea, they needes must passen by, Which seemd so sweet and pleasaunt to the eye, That it would tempt a man to touchen4 there: Upon the banck they sitting did espy A daintie damsell, dressing of her heare, By whom a little skippet5 floting did appeare.

15

She them espying, loud to them can6 call, Bidding them nigher draw unto the shore; For she had cause7 to busie them withall; And therewith lowdly laught: But nathemore Would they once turne, but kept on as afore: Which when she saw, she left her lockes undight, And running to her boat withouten ore, From the departing land it launched light, And after them did drive with all her power and might.

16

Whom overtaking, she in merry sort8 Them gan to bord, and purpose diversly,9 Now faining10 dalliaunce and wanton sport, Now throwing forth lewd wordes immodestly;

1

traveiling: traveling, going into labor. herried: celebrated, praised. As this stanza recounts, the island of Delos in the Aegean was floating and unfixed until Latona, pregnant by Jupiter, gave birth there to Diana and Apollo, deities of the moon and sun (“night and day”); cf. Ovid, Metamorphoses, 6.185–91. 3 fleet: float, flit. 4 touchen: land. 5 skippet: small boat, skiff. 2

6

can: i.e., gan, did. cause: something, a thing (as in Italian cosa). Hamilton suggests that the nature of this thing is evident in the pun on “case,” Elizabethan slang for vagina. 8 sort: manner. 9 bord: address, joke with, draw her boat alongside; purpose diversly: speak of various things. 7

10

faining: indicating, preferring.

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Till that the Palmer gan full bitterly Her to rebuke, for being loose and light: Which not abiding, but more scornfully Scoffing at him, that did her justly wite,1 She turnd her bote about, and from them rowed quite. 17

That was the wanton Phaedria, which late Did ferry him over the Idle lake: 2 Whom nought regarding, they kept on their gate,3 And all her vaine allurements did forsake, When them the wary Boteman thus bespake; “Here now behoveth us well to avyse, And of our safety good heede to take; For here before a perlous passage lyes, Where many Mermayds haunt, making false melodies.

18

“But by the way, there is a great Quicksand, And a whirlepoole of hidden jeopardy,4 Therefore, Sir Palmer, keepe an even hand; For twixt them both the narrow way5 doth ly.” Scarse had he saide, when hard at hand they spy That quicksand nigh with water covered; But by the checked6 wave they did descry It plaine, and by the sea discoloured: It called was the quicksand of Unthriftyhed.7

19

They passing by, a goodly Ship did see, Laden from far with precious merchandize, And bravely furnished,8 as ship might bee, Which through great disaventure, or mesprize,9 Her selfe had ronne into that hazardize;10 Whose mariners and merchants with much toyle,

1

wite: blame. In Canto Six; for Phaedria, see vi.9.7n. 3 gate: way. 2

4

jeopardy: danger.

5 Matt. 7.14: “the way [is] narowe that lead-

eth unto life”; cf. vii.21.3 and n. checked: impeded.

6

7

Unthriftyhed: lack of restraint, extravagance. 8 bravely furnished: well equipped. 9 disaventure, or mesprize: mischance or mistake. 10 hazardize: difficulty, peril.

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Labour’d in vaine, to have recur’d their prize, And the rich wares to save from pitteous spoyle, But neither toyle nor traveill might her backe recoyle.1 20

On th’other side they see that perilous Poole, That called was the Whirlepoole of decay, In which full many had with haplesse doole2 Beene suncke, of whom no memorie did stay: Whose circled waters rapt with whirling sway,3 Like to a restlesse wheele, still ronning round, Did covet,4 as they passed by that way, To draw their bote within the utmost bound Of his wide Labyrinth, and then to have them dround.

21

But th’earnest Boteman strongly forth did stretch His brawnie armes, and all his bodie straine, That th’utmost sandy breach they shortly fetch,5 Whiles the dredd daunger does behind remaine. Suddeine they see from midst of all the Maine,6 The surging waters like a mountaine rise, And the great sea puft up with proud disdaine, To swell above the measure of his guise,7 As threatning to devoure all, that his powre despise.

22

The waves come rolling, and the billowes rore Outragiously,8 as they enraged were, Or wrathfull Neptune9 did them drive before His whirling charet, for exceeding feare: For not one puffe of winde there did appeare, That all the three thereat woxe much afrayd, Unweeting, what such horrour10 straunge did reare. Eftsoones they saw an hideous hoast arrayd, Of huge Sea monsters, such as living sence dismayd.

1

6

2

7

backe recoyle: draw back out. doole: sorrow, deceit. 3 rapt: borne, wrapped; sway: motion. 4 covet: seek. 5 th’utmost sandy breach: the limit of where the waters break upon the quicksand; fetch: reach.

Maine: open ocean. guise: manner, usual way. 8 Outragiously: excessively, beyond their bounds. 9 Neptune: god of the sea. 10 horrour: fear, turmoil.

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23

Most ugly shapes, and horrible aspects, Such as Dame Nature selfe mote feare to see, Or shame, that ever should so fowle defects From her most cunning hand escaped bee; All dreadfull pourtraicts of deformitee: Spring-headed Hydres,1 and sea-shouldring Whales, Great whirlpooles,2 which all fishes make to flee, Bright Scolopendraes,3 arm’d with silver scales, Mighty Monoceros, with immeasured4 tayles.

24

The dreadfull Fish,5 that hath deserv’d the name Of Death, and like him lookes in dreadfull hew, That griesly Wasserman,6 that makes his game The flying ships with swiftnes to pursew, The horrible Sea-satyre, that doth shew His fearefull face in time of greatest storme, Huge Ziffius,7 whom Mariners eschew No lesse, then rockes, (as travellers informe,) And greedy Rosmarines 8 with visages deforme.

25

All these, and thousand thousands many more, And more deformed Monsters thousand fold, With dreadfull noise, and hollow rombling rore, Came rushing in the fomy waves enrold, Which seem’d to fly for feare, them to behold: Ne wonder, if these did the knight appall; For all that here on earth we dreadfull hold,9 Be but as bugs to fearen10 babes withall, Compared to the creatures in the seas entrall.11

1 The Hydra is “Spring-headed” because its

heads regenerate when cut off. 2 whirlpooles: another word for whales, from their habit of spouting. 3

Scolopendraes: legendary sea creatures mentioned by Aristotle. 4 Monoceros: narwhal (Greek, “one-horned”); immeasured: immense; but the sense “mis-measured” may also be present since, as commentators have long noted, the meter of this line is uneven.

5

The walrus, also known as a “morse,” which Spenser in the next line associates with mors, Latin for death. 6 Wasserman: merman, a combination of man and fish. 7

Ziffius: swordfish. Rosmarines: seahorse, perhaps another name for walrus. 9 hold: deem, consider. 10 bugs: bugbears, bogey men; fearen: frighten. 11 entrall: entrails, depths. 8

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26

“Feare nought,” then saide the Palmer well aviz’d; “For these same Monsters are not these in deed, But are into these fearefull shapes disguiz’d By that same wicked witch, to worke us dreed,1 And draw from on this journey to proceed.” Tho lifting up his vertuous2 staffe on hye, He smote the sea, which calmed was with speed, And all that dreadfull Armie fast gan flye Into great Tethys3 bosome, where they hidden lye.

27

Quit4 from that danger, forth their course they kept, And as they went, they heard a ruefull cry Of one, that wayld and pittifully wept, That through the sea the resounding plaints did fly: At last they in an Island did espy A seemely5 Maiden, sitting by the shore, That with great sorrow and sad agony, Seemed some great misfortune to deplore,6 And lowd to them for succour called evermore.

28

Which Guyon hearing, streight his Palmer bad,7 To stere the bote towards that dolefull Mayd, That he might know, and ease her sorrow sad: Who him avizing better, to him sayd; “Faire Sir, be not displeasd if disobayd: For ill it were to hearken to her cry; For she is inly nothing ill apayd,8 But onely womanish fine forgery,9 Your stubborne hart t’affect with fraile infirmity.

29

“To which when she your courage hath inclind10 Through foolish pitty, then her guilefull bayt She will embosome11 deeper in your mind,

1 worke us dreed: cause us fear; the witch is Acrasia. 2 vertuous: powerful, magical. The Palmer calms the sea like Neptune in Virgil, Aeneid, 1.142–43, or like Jesus at Mark 4.39. 3 Tethys: goddess of the sea. 4

Quit: freed.

5 seemely: comely, seeming (the latter em-

phasized by “Seemed” in line 8).

6

205

deplore: bewail. bad: bade, ordered. 8 ill apayd: displeased, unhappy. 9 fine forgery: subtle deception. 10 your courage hath inclind: has swayed or diverted your heart. 7

11

embosome: implant.

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And for your ruine at the last awayt.” The Knight was ruled, and the Boteman strayt Held on his course with stayed stedfastnesse, Ne ever shroncke, ne ever sought to bayt1 His tyred armes for toylesome wearinesse, But with his oares did sweepe the watry wildernesse. 30

And now they nigh approched to the sted, Where as those Mermayds dwelt:2 it was a still And calmy bay, on th’one side sheltered With the brode shadow of an hoarie hill, On th’other side an high rocke toured3 still, That twixt them both a pleasaunt port they made, And did like an halfe Theatre fulfill:4 There those five sisters had continuall trade,5 And usd to bath themselves in that deceiptfull shade.

31

They were faire Ladies, till they fondly striv’d With th’Heliconian maides6 for maystery; Of whom they over-comen, were depriv’d Of their proud beautie, and th’one moyity7 Transform’d to fish, for their bold surquedry,8 But th’upper halfe their hew retayned still, And their sweet skill in wonted melody; Which ever after they abusd to ill, T’allure weake traveillers, whom gotten they did kill.

32

So now to Guyon, as he passed by, Their pleasaunt tunes they sweetly thus applyde; “O thou fayre sonne of gentle Faery, That art in mightie armes most magnifyde9 Above all knights, that ever batteill tryde, O turne thy rudder hetherward a while:

1

bayt: abate, rest. The mermaids are based on the Sirens who call to Odysseus in Homer, Odyssey, 12.165–200. 3 toured: towered. 4 I.e., and made a form like a semicircular theater. 2

5 had continuall trade: habitually led their lives, had constant occupation. 6 th’Heliconian maides: the Muses, who had their seat on Mt. Helicon. 7 moyity: half. 8 surquedry: presumption. 9 magnifyde: exalted.

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Here may thy storme-bett vessell safely ryde;1 This is the Port of rest from troublous toyle, The worldes sweet In,2 from paine and wearisome turmoyle.” 33

With that the rolling sea resounding soft, In his big base them fitly answered, And on the rocke the waves breaking aloft, A solemne Meane3 unto them measured, The whiles sweet Zephyrus 4 lowd whisteled His treble, a straunge kinde of harmony; Which Guyons senses softly tickeled, That he the boteman bad row easily,5 And let him heare some part of their rare melody.

34

But him the Palmer from that vanity, With temperate advice discounselled, That they it past, and shortly gan descry The land, to which their course they leveled;6 When suddeinly a grosse7 fog over spred With his dull vapour all that desert has,8 And heavens chearefull face enveloped, That all things one, and one as nothing was, And this great Universe seemd one confused mas.

35

Thereat they greatly were dismayd, ne wist How to direct theyr way in darkenes wide, But feard to wander in that wastefull9 mist, For10 tombling into mischiefe unespide. Worse is the daunger hidden, then descried. Suddeinly an innumerable flight Of harmefull fowles about them fluttering, cride, And with their wicked wings them ofte did smight, And sore annoyed, groping in that griesly night.

1 storme-bett: weatherbeaten; ryde: lie at anchor. 2 In: inn, resting place. 3 Meane: middle part of a four-part harmony, consisting of the sea (the “base,” i.e., bass), the breaking waves, the mermaids’ song, and the wind’s whistle (the treble, or soprano). 4

Zephyrus: the west wind.

5

easily: gently, slowly. leveled: aimed. 7 grosse: thick. 8 desert: the ocean; has: i.e., has overspread. For the equation of the desert with the ocean, cf. ii.22.6. 9 wastefull: excessive, bleak, destructive. 10 For: for fear of. 6

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Even all the nation1 of unfortunate And fatall birds about them flocked were, Such as by nature men abhorre and hate, The ill-faste2 Owle, deaths dreadfull messengere, The hoars Night-raven, trump of dolefull drere,3 The lether-winged Batt, dayes enimy, The ruefull Strich, still waiting on the bere,4 The whistler shrill, that who so heares, doth dy, The hellish Harpyes, prophets of sad destiny.5

37

All those, and all that els does horror breed, About them flew, and fild their sayles with feare: Yet stayd they not, but forward did proceed, Whiles th’one did row, and th’other stifly steare; Till that at last the weather gan to cleare, And the faire land it selfe did plainly sheow. Said then the Palmer, “Lo where does appeare The sacred6 soile, where all our perills grow; Therfore, Sir knight, your ready arms about you throw.”

38

He hearkned, and his armes about him tooke, The whiles the nimble bote so well her sped, That with her crooked7 keele the land she strooke, Then forth the noble Guyon sallied, And his sage Palmer, that him governed; But th’other by his bote behind did stay. They marched fayrly forth, of nought ydred, Both firmely armd for every hard assay, With constancy and care, gainst daunger and dismay.

39

Ere long they heard an hideous bellowing Of many beasts, that roard outrageously, As if that hungers point,8 or Venus sting Had them enraged with fell surquedry;9

1

5

2

6

nation: family. ill-faste: ugly; the owl’s hooting was supposed to portend death. 3 trump: trumpet, announcer; drere: sorrow. 4 Strich: screech-owl; bere: bier (the screech-owl was said to haunt funerals).

See vii.23.6 and n. sacred: in the rare sense of “accursed.” 7 crooked: curved. 8 point: pang. 9 surquedry: pride, excess.

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Yet nought they feard, but past on hardily, Untill they came in vew of those wilde beasts: Who all attonce, gaping full greedily, And rearing fercely their upstaring1 crests, Ran towards, to devoure those unexpected guests. 40

But soone as they approcht with deadly threat, The Palmer over them his staffe upheld, His mighty staffe, that could all charmes defeat: Eftesoones their stubborne corages were queld, And high advaunced crests downe meekely feld,2 Instead of fraying,3 they them selves did feare, And trembled, as them passing they beheld: Such wondrous powre did in that staffe appeare, All monsters to subdew to him, that did it beare.

41

Of that same wood it fram’d was cunningly, Of which Caduceus whilome was made, Caduceus the rod of Mercury,4 With which he wonts the Stygian realmes invade,5 Through ghastly horror, and eternall shade; Th’infernall feends with it he can asswage, And Orcus 6 tame, whome nothing can persuade, And rule the Furyes,7 when they most doe rage: Such vertue in his staffe had eke this Palmer sage.

42

Thence passing forth, they shortly doe arryve, Whereas the Bowre of Blisse was situate; A place pickt out by choice of best alyve, That natures worke by art can imitate:8 In which what ever in this worldly state Is sweete, and pleasing unto living sense,

1 2

upstaring: bristling.

feld: lowered, folded. 3 fraying: causing fright. 4 Among the functions of Mercury, the Roman messenger god, was that of leading dead souls to the underworld. For this he used his Caduceus, a staff twined with serpents; see Homer, Odyssey, 24.1–5 and Virgil, Aeneid, 4.242–44.

5 6

invade: enter.

Orcus: one of the names of Dis or Pluto, god of the underworld. 7 Furyes: implacable goddesses of revenge. 8 I.e., a place picked out by those artisans most skilled at imitating nature.

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Or that may dayntest fantasy aggrate,1 Was poured forth with plentifull dispence,2 And made there to abound with lavish affluence. 43

Goodly it was enclosed rownd about, Aswell their entred guestes to keep within, As those unruly beasts to hold without; Yet was the fence thereof but weake and thin; Nought feard theyr force, that fortilage to win,3 But wisedomes powre, and temperaunces might, By which the mightiest things efforced4 bin: And eke the gate was wrought of substaunce light, Rather for pleasure, then for battery or fight.

44

Yt framed was of precious yvory, That seemd a worke of admirable witt;5 And therein all that famous history Of Jason and Medaea was ywritt;6 Her mighty charmes, her furious loving fitt, His goodly conquest of the golden fleece, His falsed fayth, and love too lightly flitt,7 The wondred Argo, which in venturous peece8 First through the Euxine seas bore all the flowr of Greece.9

45

Ye might have seen the frothy billowes fry10 Under the ship, as thorough them she went, That seemd the waves were into yvory, Or yvory into the waves were sent;11 And otherwhere the snowy substaunce sprent12

1

dayntest fantasy aggrate: please the finest fancy. 2 dispence: bounty. 3 I.e., there was no fear that the force (of the beasts) would conquer that fort (“fortilage”). 4 efforced: forced open, gained by force. 5 witt: skill. 6 ywritt: depicted. 7 falsed: broken; flitt: fled, shifted. 8 peece: vessel. 9 This stanza runs through some of the chief events in the story of Jason and Medea.

Jason sailed with the Greek heroes (“the flowr of Greece”) on the ship Argo to the Black Sea (“Euxine”) in search of the Golden Fleece. There he met Medea, who, seized with excessive love for him, helped him steal the Fleece. Yet Jason later broke his faith to her and tried to marry Creusa instead, upon which Medea killed both Creusa and her own children by Jason (as mentioned in the following stanza). 10

fry: foam. sent: converted. 12 sprent: sprinkled. 11

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With vermell,1 like the boyes blood therein shed, A piteous spectacle did represent, And otherwhiles with gold besprinkeled; Yt seemd thenchaunted flame, which did Creusa wed.2 46

All this, and more might in that goodly gate Be red; that ever open stood to all, Which thether came: but in the Porch3 their sate A comely personage of stature tall, And semblaunce pleasing, more then naturall, That traveilers to him seemd to entize; His looser4 garment to the ground did fall, And flew about his heeles in wanton wize, Not fitt for speedy pace, or manly exercize.

47

They in that place him Genius 5 did call: Not that celestiall powre, to whom the care Of life, and generation of all That lives, perteines6 in charge particulare, Who wondrous things concerning our welfare, And straunge phantomes doth lett us ofte forsee, And ofte of secret ill bids us beware: That is our Selfe,7 whom though we doe not see, Yet each doth in him selfe it well perceive to bee.

48

Therefore a God him sage Antiquity Did wisely make, and good Agdistes 8 call: But this same was to that quite contrary,9 The foe of life, that good envyes10 to all,

1

vermell: vermilion, a bright red dye. Medea stabbed her sons (the “boyes” of line 6 above), but murdered Creusa by giving her a wedding gown that burned her when she put it on. 3 Porch: front portion of the gatehouse. 4 looser: very loose, too loose. 5 Having named the figure, Spenser spends the next ten lines distinguishing him from the other character of the same name. The good Genius, who appears in a parallel position as porter of the Garden of Adonis at III.vi.31–32, serves both as the patron of birth or generation in general, and also as a 2

guardian or tutelary spirit to each individual. In the latter role, he helps us in time of peril; cf. Guyon’s guardian angel at viii.5–8. 6 perteines: belongs. 7 In his role as guardian spirit, the good Genius is essentially indistinguishable from our own divine soul. 8

Agdistes is the name of an obscure classical deity.

9

I.e., but this figure (the porter of the Bower) was the very opposite of the figure just described. 10 envyes: begrudges.

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That secretly doth us procure1 to fall, Through guilefull semblants, which he makes us see. He of this Gardin had the governall,2 And Pleasures porter was devizd3 to bee, Holding a staffe in hand for more formalitee. 49

With diverse flowres he daintily was deckt, And strowed rownd about, and by his side A mighty Mazer4 bowle of wine was sett, As if it had to him bene sacrifide;5 Wherewith all new-come guests he gratyfide:6 So did he eke Sir Guyon passing by: But he his ydle curtesie defide, And overthrew his bowle disdainfully; And broke his staffe, with which he charmed semblants sly.7

50

Thus being entred, they behold arownd A large and spacious plaine, on every side Strowed with pleasauns,8 whose fayre grassy grownd Mantled9 with greene, and goodly beautifide With all the ornaments of Floraes pride,10 Wherewith her mother Art,11 as halfe in scorne Of niggard Nature, like a pompous12 bride Did decke her, and too lavishly adorne, When forth from virgin bowre she comes in th’early morne.

1

procure: cause. governall: governanace. This figure is thus both the genius loci, the presiding spirit of the place, and also, allegorically, each person’s misleading “bad genius,” the counterpart to one’s good angel. 2

3

devizd: designated, considered, feigned. Mazer: maple. 5 sacrifide: consecrated, offered up. 4

6

gratyfide: welcomed, pleased. charmed semblants sly: slyly conjured false appearances. 8 pleasauns: pleasure-grounds. 9 Mantled: clothed, suffused. 7

10 I.e., with flowers; Flora was the Roman goddess of flowers. 11 The Bower of Bliss is the child, not of Nature, but of Art, which decorates it lavishly. “Art,” in Spenser’s work as in his time more generally, can have both positive connotations (as representing human skill and achievement) and negative (as suggesting artifice and deception). The relationship between art and nature forms a major subject of this canto; see below, 58.5n. 12 niggard: stingy; pompous: magnificent, ostentatious.

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51

Therewith the Heavens alwayes Joviall,1 Lookte on them lovely, still in stedfast state, Ne suffred storme nor frost on them to fall, Their tender buds or leaves to violate,2 Nor scorching heat, nor cold intemperate T’afflict the creatures, which therein did dwell, But the milde ayre with season moderate Gently attempred,3 and disposd so well, That still it breathed forth sweet spirit and holesom smell.

52

More sweet and holesome, then the pleasaunt hill Of Rhodope, on which the Nimphe, that bore A gyaunt babe, her selfe for griefe did kill:4 Or the Thessalian Tempe, where of yore Fayre Daphne Phoebus hart with love did gore;5 Or Ida, where the Gods lov’d to repayre,6 When ever they their heavenly bowres forlore; Or sweet Parnasse,7 the haunt of Muses fayre; Or Eden selfe, if ought with Eden mote compayre.

53

Much wondred Guyon at the fayre aspect Of that sweet place, yet suffred no delight To sincke into his sence, nor mind affect, But passed forth, and lookt still forward right,8 Brydling his will, and maystering his might: Till that he came unto another gate, No gate, but like one, being goodly dight With bowes and braunches, which did broad dilate9 Their clasping armes, in wanton wreathings intricate.

1

Therewith: in addition, moreover; Joviall: smiling, favorable; literally, under the influence of Jupiter. The description that follows, with its negative constructions (Ne . . . nor . . . Nor), is based on a classical trope deriving from Homer—e.g., Odyssey, 4.567–69, 6.43–45. 2 violate: injure, ravish. 3 attempred: regulated. 4 Mt. Rhodope was named after a nymph who was transformed into the mountain for her presumption; see Ovid, Metamorphoses, 6.87–89.

5

213

Phoebus (Apollo) fell in love with the nymph Daphne in the vale of Tempe in Thessaly, where he pursued her against her will until she was transformed into a laurel; see Metamorphoses, 1.452–567. 6 repayre: retire. Mt. Ida near Troy was where Paris judged the three goddesses, choosing Venus as the fairest and thus setting in motion the Trojan War. 7 Mount Parnassus at Delphi was the seat of the Muses. 8 forward right: straight ahead. 9 dilate: spread.

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54

So fashioned a Porch with rare device,1 Archt over head with an embracing vine, Whose bounches2 hanging downe, seemd to entice All passers by, to taste their lushious wine, And did them selves into their hands incline, As freely offering to be gathered: Some deepe empurpled as the Hyacint,3 Some as the Rubine,4 laughing sweetely red, Some like faire Emeraudes, not yet well ripened.

55

And them amongst, some were of burnisht gold, So made by art, to beautify the rest, Which did themselves emongst the leaves enfold, As lurking from the vew of covetous guest, That the weake boughes, with so rich load opprest, Did bow adowne, as overburdened. Under that Porch a comely dame did rest, Clad in fayre weedes, but fowle disordered, And garments loose, that seemd unmeet for womanhed.

56

In her left hand a Cup of gold she held, And with her right the riper fruit did reach, Whose sappy liquor,5 that with fulnesse sweld, Into her cup she scruzd, with daintie breach6 Of her fine fingers, without fowle empeach,7 That so faire winepresse made the wine more sweet: Thereof she usd to give to drinke to each, Whom passing by she happened to meet: It was her guise, all Straungers goodly so to greet.

57

So she to Guyon offred it to tast, Who taking it out of her tender hond, The cup to ground did violently cast, That all in peeces it was broken fond, And with the liquor stained all the lond:

1

4

2

5

device: design. bounches: clusters (of grapes). 3 Hyacint: hyacinth, both a gemstone (also called jacinth) and a flower. Some editions read “Hyacine” to preserve the rhyme; see ii.7.7n.

6

Rubine: ruby. sappy liquor: juicy liquid.

scruzd: squeezed; breach: crushing. empeach: detriment, sullying (of either the juice or the fingers).

7

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Whereat Excesse exceedingly was wroth, Yet no’te the same amend, ne yet withstond, But suffered him to passe, all1 were she loth; Who nought regarding her displeasure, forward goth. 58

There the most daintie Paradise on ground, It selfe doth offer to his sober eye, In which all pleasures plenteously abownd, And none does others happinesse envye: The painted2 flowres, the trees upshooting hye, The dales for shade, the hilles for breathing space, The trembling groves, the christall3 running by; And that, which all faire workes doth most aggrace,4 The art, which all that wrought, appeared in no place.

59

One would have thought, (so cunningly, the rude5 And scorned6 partes were mingled with the fine,) That nature had for wantonesse ensude7 Art, and that Art at nature did repine;8 So striving each th’other to undermine, Each did the others worke more beautify; So diff’ring both in willes, agreed in fine:9 So all agreed through sweete diversity, This Gardin to adorne with all variety.

60

And in the midst of all, a fountaine stood, Of richest substance, that on earth might bee, So pure and shiny, that the silver flood Through every channell running one might see; Most goodly it with curious ymageree

1

all: although. painted: colorful, variegated; but given that the garden contains grapes made of gold (above, 55.1) and that art has enhanced nature throughout (stanza 59), some of the flowers may simply be painted. Alternately, they may be hybridized by crossbreeding, a mingling of art and nature that was a subject of contemporary debate; see, for instance, Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, 4.1.79–108. 2

3

christall: clear streams. aggrace: enhance. 5 rude: simple, unadorned. 6 scorned: humble, neglected. 7 for wantonesse ensude: imitated in jest or out of extravagance. 8 repine: complain, chafe. 9 in fine: in the end, and also perhaps “in finery.” 4

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Was overwrought,1 and shapes of naked boyes, Of which some seemd with lively jollitee, To fly about, playing their wanton toyes,2 Whylest others did them selves embay3 in liquid joyes, 61

And over all, of purest gold was spred, A trayle of yvie in his native hew:4 For the rich metall was so coloured, That wight, who did not well avis’d it vew, Would surely deeme it to bee yvie trew: Low his lascivious armes adown did creepe, That themselves dipping in the silver dew,5 Their fleecy flowres they fearefully6 did steepe, Which drops of Christall seemd for wantones to weep.

62

Infinit streames continually did well Out of this fountaine, sweet and faire to see, The which into an ample laver7 fell, And shortly grew to so great quantitie, That like a litle lake it seemd to bee; Whose depth exceeded not three cubits8 hight, That through the waves one might the bottom see, All pav’d beneath with Jaspar9 shining bright, That seemd the fountaine in that sea did sayle10 upright.

63

And all the margent11 round about was sett, With shady Laurell trees, thence to defend12 The sunny beames, which on the billowes bett,13 And those which therein bathed, mote offend: As Guyon hapned by the same to wend, Two naked Damzelles he therein espyde,

1

overwrought: wrought all over, overworked; cf. Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” 41–42 (“with brede / Of marble men and maidens overwrought”). 2 toyes: games. 3 embay: bathe, drench. 4 his native hew: its natural color. 5 silver dew: silvery water. 6

fleecy: soft; fearefully: tremulously.

7

laver: basin. cubits: a measure the length of a forearm. 9 Jaspar: jasper, a crystal that exists in a range of different shades. 10 sayle: leap, dance. 11 margent: margin. 12 defend: keep off. 13 bett: beat. 8

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Which therein bathing, seemed to contend, And wrestle wantonly, ne car’d to hyde, Their dainty partes from vew of any, which them eyd. 64

Sometimes the one would lift the other quight Above the waters, and then downe againe Her plong,1 as over maystered by might, Where both awhile would covered remaine, And each the other from to rise2 restraine; The whiles their snowy limbes, as through a vele,3 So through the christall waves appeared plaine: Then suddeinly both would themselves unhele,4 And th’amarous5 sweet spoiles to greedy eyes revele.

65

As that faire Starre,6 the messenger of morne, His deawy face out of the sea doth reare: Or as the Cyprian goddesse,7 newly borne Of th’Oceans fruitfull froth, did first appeare: Such seemed they, and so their yellow heare Christalline humor8 dropped downe apace. Whom such when Guyon saw, he drew him neare, And somewhat gan relent his earnest pace; His stubborne brest gan secret pleasaunce to embrace.

66

The wanton Maidens him espying, stood Gazing a while at his unwonted9 guise; Then th’one her selfe low ducked in the flood, Abasht, that her a straunger did avise:10 But thother rather higher did arise, And her two lilly paps aloft displayd, And all, that might his melting hart entyse To her delights, she unto him bewrayd:11 The rest hidd underneath, him more desirous made.

1

plong: plunge. to rise: rising. 3 vele: veil. 4 unhele: uncover. 5 amarous: erotic, but with a hint of “bitter” (Latin amarus). 6 The morning star, also called Phosphor or Lucifer. 2

7

Cyprian goddesse: Venus, who had a shrine in Cyprus and who was born out of the foam of the sea (“Oceans fruitfull froth”). 8 humor: liquid. 9 unwonted: unaccustomed, unusual (for him). 10 avise: behold. 11 bewrayd: revealed.

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218 67

With that, the other likewise up arose, And her faire lockes, which formerly were bownd Up in one knott, she low adowne did lose:1 Which flowing long and thick, her cloth’d arownd, And th’yvorie in golden mantle gownd: So that faire spectacle from him was reft, Yet that, which reft it, no lesse faire was fownd: So hidd in lockes and waves from lookers theft,2 Nought but her lovely face she for his looking left.

68

Withall she laughed, and she blusht withall, That blushing to her laughter gave more grace, And laughter to her blushing, as did fall:3 Now when they spyde the knight to slacke his pace, Them to behold, and in his sparkling face The secrete signes of kindled lust appeare, Their wanton meriments they did encreace, And to him beckned, to approch more neare, And shewd him many sights, that corage cold could reare.4

69

On which when gazing him the Palmer saw, He much rebukt those wandring eyes of his, And counseld well, him forward thence did draw. Now are they come nigh to the Bowre of blis Of her fond favorites so nam’d amis: When thus the Palmer, “Now Sir, well avise; For here the end of all our traveill5 is: Here wonnes Acrasia, whom we must surprise, Els she will slip away, and all our drift despise.”6

70

Eftsoones they heard a most melodious sound, Of all that mote delight a daintie eare, Such as attonce7 might not on living ground, Save in this Paradise, be heard elswhere: Right hard it was, for wight, which did it heare,

1 2

lose: loosen.

I.e., from an onlooker’s stealing a glance. 3 fall: befall, happen. 4 corage: desire; reare: arouse.

5

end: aim, completion; traveill: labor, voyage. 6 drift: plan; despise: scorn, render contemptible. 7 attonce: all together.

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To read, what manner musicke that mote bee: For all that pleasing is to living eare, Was there consorted 1 in one harmonee, Birdes, voices, instruments, windes, waters, all agree. 71

The joyous birdes shrouded in chearefull shade, Their notes unto the voice attempred2 sweet; Th’Angelicall soft trembling voyces made To th’instruments divine respondence3 meet: The silver sounding instruments did meet4 With the base5 murmure of the waters fall: The waters fall with difference discreet,6 Now soft, now loud, unto the wind did call: The gentle warbling wind low answered to all.

72

There, whence that Musick seemed heard to bee, Was the faire Witch her selfe now solacing,7 With a new Lover, whom through sorceree And witchcraft, she from farre did thether bring: There she had him now laid a slombering, In secret shade, after long wanton joyes: Whilst round about them pleasauntly did sing Many faire Ladies, and lascivious boyes, That ever mixt their song with light licentious toyes.8

73

And all that while, right over him she hong, With her false eyes fast fixed in his sight, As seeking medicine, whence she was stong,9 Or greedily depasturing10 delight: And oft inclining11 downe with kisses light, For feare of waking him, his lips bedewd,

1

7

2

8

consorted: arranged, combined. attempred: attuned. 3 respondence: response. 4 meet: join. 5 base: low, bass. 6 difference discreet: distinct variation (Hamilton).

solacing: taking pleasure. toyes: play. 9 I.e., as if seeking remedy in the very thing that caused her injury (namely, the sight of his beauty). 10 depasturing: feeding on. 11 inclining: bending.

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And through his humid eyes did sucke his spright, Quite molten1 into lust and pleasure lewd; Wherewith she sighed soft, as if his case she rewd. 74

The whiles some one did chaunt this lovely2 lay; “Ah see, who so fayre thing doest faine to see, In springing flowre the image of thy day; Ah see the Virgin Rose, how sweetly shee Doth first peepe foorth with bashfull modestee, That fairer seemes, the lesse ye see her may; Lo see soone after, how more bold and free Her bared bosome she doth broad display; Lo see soone after, how she fades, and falls away.

75

“So passeth, in the passing of a day, Of mortall life the leafe, the bud, the flowre, Ne more doth florish after first decay, That earst was sought to deck both bed and bowre, Of many a Lady’, and many a Paramowre: Gather therefore the Rose, whilest yet is prime,3 For soone comes age, that will her pride deflowre: Gather the Rose of love, whilest yet is time, Whilest loving thou mayst loved be with equall crime.”4

76

He ceast, and then gan all the quire of birdes Their diverse notes t’attune unto his lay, As in approvaunce of his pleasing wordes. The constant5 payre heard all, that he did say, Yet swarved not, but kept their forward way, Through many covert groves, and thickets close, In which they creeping did at last display6 That wanton Lady, with her lover lose, Whose sleepie head she in her lap did soft dispose.7

1

molten: melted. lovely: beautiful, of love. This “lay” or song is an example of the theme of carpe diem (literally “seize the day”), introduced in Roman poetry and greatly expanded on in the Renaissance. Spenser’s immediate model is Tasso, Gerusalemme Liberata, 16.14–15. 2

3

prime: early, in her prime. crime: guilt; the last word of the song breaks the spell cast by the rest. 4 5

constant: steadfast, faithful. display: discover. 7 dispose: lay, cradle. 6

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77

Upon a bed of Roses she was layd, As faint through heat, or dight to pleasant sin, And was arayd, or rather disarayd, All in a vele of silke and silver thin, That hid no whit her alablaster1 skin, But rather shewd more white, if more might bee: More subtile web Arachne 2 cannot spin, Nor the fine nets, which oft we woven see Of scorched deaw,3 do not in th’ayre more lightly flee.

78

Her snowy brest was bare to ready spoyle4 Of hungry eies, which n’ote therewith be fild, And yet through languour5 of her late sweet toyle, Few drops, more cleare then Nectar, forth distild, That like pure Orient perles adowne it trild,6 And her faire eyes sweet smyling in delight, Moystened their fierie beames, with which she thrild Fraile harts, yet quenched not; like starry light Which sparckling on the silent waves, does seeme more bright.

79

The young man sleeping by her, seemd to be Some goodly swayne of honorable place,7 That certes it great pitty was to see Him his nobility so fowle deface; A sweet regard,8 and amiable grace, Mixed with manly sternesse did appeare Yet9 sleeping, in his well proportiond face, And on his tender lips the downy heare Did now but freshly spring, and silken blossoms beare.

1

4

2

5

alablaster: alabaster, ivory-white. subtile: fine, light; Arachne: the spider, or else the name of the girl, expert in weaving, who according to myth was turned into a spider. 3

The “fine nets” are also spiderwebs, pictured as being fabricated of dried dew.

spoyle: ravishment. languour: weariness. 6 trild: trickled. 7 place: rank, station. 8 regard: aspect, look. 9 Yet: even while.

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80

His warlike Armes, the ydle instruments Of sleeping praise,1 were hong upon a tree, And his brave shield, full of old moniments,2 Was fowly ra’st,3 that none the signes might see, Ne for them, ne for honour cared hee, Ne ought, that did to his advauncement tend, But in lewd loves, and wastfull luxuree,4 His dayes, his goods, his bodie he did spend: O horrible enchantment, that him so did blend.5

81

The noble Elfe, and carefull Palmer drew So nigh them, minding nought,6 but lustfull game, That suddein forth they on them rusht, and threw A subtile net, which only for that same7 The skilfull Palmer formally8 did frame. So held them under fast, the whiles the rest Fled all away for feare of fowler shame. The faire Enchauntresse, so unwares opprest,9 Tryde all her arts, and all her sleights, thence out to wrest.10

82

And eke her lover strove: but all in vaine; For that same net so cunningly was wound, That neither guile, nor force might it distraine.11 They tooke them both, and both them strongly bound In captive bandes, which there they readie found: But her in chaines of adamant12 he tyde;

1 While he sleeps, so does the praise that he would otherwise be winning with his arms, now “ydle.” His position resembles a traditional emblem of effeminization or emasculation; see, for instance, Botticelli’s painting, Venus and Mars. 2 moniments: emblems, tokens of former accomplishment. 3 ra’st: erased. 4 luxuree: excess, lust. 5 blend: blind.

6

minding nought: heedful of nothing. that same: that very purpose. 8 formally: in good order, expressly. The Palmer’s net echoes the one used by Hephaestus to trap Ares and Aphrodite in Homer, Odyssey, 8.272–99. 9 opprest: surprised, held down. 7

10

wrest: twist. distraine: tear off. 12 adamant: the strongest or hardest substance in the world. 11

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For nothing else might keepe her safe and sound; But Verdant1 (so he hight) he soone untyde, And counsell sage in steed thereof to him applyde. 83

But all those pleasaunt bowres and Pallace brave,2 Guyon broke downe, with rigour pittilesse; Ne ought their goodly workmanship might save Them from the tempest of his wrathfulnesse, But that their blisse he turn’d to balefulnesse:3 Their groves he feld, their gardins did deface, Their arbers spoyle, their Cabinets suppresse,4 Their banket houses burne, their buildings race,5 And of the fayrest late, now made the fowlest place.

84

Then led they her away, and eke that knight They with them led, both sorrowfull and sad: The way they came, the same retourn’d they right, Till they arrived, where they lately had Charm’d those wild-beasts, that rag’d with furie mad. Which now awaking, fierce at them gan fly, As in their mistresse reskew, whom they lad;6 But them the Palmer soone did pacify. Then Guyon askt, what meant those beastes, which there did ly.

85

Sayd he, “These seeming beasts are men indeed, Whom this Enchauntresse hath transformed thus, Whylome her lovers, which her lustes did feed,7 Now turned into figures hideous, According to their mindes like monstruous.” “Sad end” (quoth he) “of life intemperate, And mournefull meed of joyes delicious: But Palmer, if it mote thee so aggrate,8 Let them returned be unto their former state.”

1

Verdant is the counterpart of Mortdant at the beginning of the book (see i.Arg.3 and i.49.9n.). The word “verdant” means green and flourishing, as for instance at I.ii.17.9; the name also suggests Latin viridens, fresh, youthful, in the prime of life. 2 brave: magnificent. 3 balefulnesse: grief. 4 Cabinets suppresse: cabins cast down.

5

race: raze. lad: led. 7 I.e., who satisfied her lusts. Acrasia’s transformation of men into beasts derives from Circe’s similar treatment of Odysseus’ men in Book 10 of Homer’s Odyssey, to which Virgil makes reference in Aeneid, 7.15–20. 8 aggrate: please. 6

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86

Streight way he with his vertuous1 staffe them strooke, And streight of beastes they comely men became; Yet being men they did unmanly looke, And stared ghastly, some for inward shame, And some for wrath, to see their captive Dame: But one above the rest in speciall, That had an hog beene late, hight Grylle2 by name, Repyned greatly, and did him miscall,3 That had from hoggish forme him brought to naturall.4

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Saide Guyon, “See the mind of beastly man, That hath so soone forgot the excellence Of his creation, when he life began, That now he chooseth, with vile difference,5 To be a beast, and lacke intelligence.” To whom the Palmer thus, “The donghill kinde Delightes in filth and fowle incontinence: Let Gryll be Gryll, and have his hoggish minde;6 But let us hence depart, whilest wether serves and winde.”

1

Cf. above, 26.6 and n. According to Plutarch, this was the name of one of Odysseus’ men who, having been turned into a pig (Greek grullos) by Circe, refused to be turned back. 2

3

Repyned: fretted, complained; miscall: insult, abuse.

4

I.e., to his original form. difference: alteration, distinction, disagreement. 6 Cf. Rev. 22.11: “He that is unjust, let him be unjust stil: and he which is filthie, let him be filthie stil.” 5

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THE LETTER TO RALEIGH A Letter of the Authors expounding his whole intention in the course of this worke: which for that it giueth great light to the Reader, for the better vnderstanding is hereunto annexed. To the Right noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh knight, Lo. Wardein of the Stanneryes, and her Maiesties liefetenaunt of the County of Cornewayll.1 Sir knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, and this booke of mine, which I have entituled the Faery Queene, being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good aswell for avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned.The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline:2 Which for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible3 and pleasing, being coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter, then for profite of the ensample: I chose the historye of king Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In which I have followed all the antique Poets historicall, first Homere, who in the Persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his Odysseis: then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person of Aeneas: after him Ariosto comprised them 1

Appended to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh,” also called “A Letter of the Authors,” has been read as a preface, detailing both the larger plot and the poetics underlying the poem. It was not included in the 1596 edi-

tion, and so only discusses the first three books directly. 2 discipline: learning, training, orderly conduct, the system by which a church exercises control over its members. 3

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plausible: deserving applause, acceptable.

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both in his Orlando:1 and lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that part which they in Philosophy call Ethice, or vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo:The other named Politice in his Godfredo.2 By ensample of which excellente Poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised,3 the which is the purpose of these first twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encoraged, to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hee came to be king.4 To some I know this Methode will seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the use of these dayes seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon preferred before Plato, for that the one in the exquisite depth of his judgement, formed a Commune welth such as it should be, but the other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a government such as might best be: So much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by ensample, then by rule.5 So have I laboured to doe in the person of Arthure: whome I conceive after his long education by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery land. And yet in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady, this latter part in some places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phoebe and Cynthia being both names of Diana).6 So in the person of 1 Lodovico Ariosto, Italian author of Orlando Furioso (1532). 2 Torquato Tasso, Italian author of Rinaldo (1562) and Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), in which the hero Godfredo embodies public or political virtues. 3 Aristotle does not name twelve particular moral virtues in the Nicomachaean Ethics. There are, however, several Medieval and Renaissance commentaries on Aristotle from which twelve could be construed. 4

Spenser indicates that he planned twelve books for The Faerie Queene and would

willingly write twenty-four, the former matching Virgil, the latter Homer. 5 Spenser says that Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, celebrated for teaching by example, is commonly preferred to Plato’s Republic, which taught by precepts. 6

Belphoebe appears in Books Two, Three, and Four. Cynthia refers to Raleigh’s poem of that name, which also celebrated Elizabeth. Spenser suggests that Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, represents Elizabeth’s public role as monarch, while Belphoebe personifies her private, virginal life.

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Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particular, which vertue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue, which I write of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues, I make xii. other knights the patrones, for the more variety of the history: Of which these three bookes contayn three.The first of the knight of the Redcrosse, in whome I expresse Holynes:The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette forth Temperaunce: The third of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the Methode of a Poet historical is not such, as of an Historiographer. For an Historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a Poet thrusteth into the middest,1 even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a pleasing Analysis of all.The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an Historiographer should be the twelfth booke, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queene kept her Annuall feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, are in these xii books severally handled and discoursed.The first was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe a tall clownishe 2 younge man, who falling before the Queen of Faries desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen, that being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after entred a faire Ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a white Asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the Armes of a knight, and his speare in the dwarfes hand. Shee falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned that her father and mother an ancient King and Queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen3 Castle, who thence suffred them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wondering, and the Lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly importuned his desire. In the end the Lady told him that unlesse that armour which she brought, would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint Paul v. Ephes.4) that he could not succeed in that enterprise, which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furnitures5 thereunto, he seemed

1

4

2

5

See Horace, Ars Poetica, 146–52. clownishe: rustic. 3 brasen: strong like brass.

See Eph. 6.11–17. dewe furnitures: proper equipment.

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the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady. And eftesoones1 taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge Courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke, vz. A gentle knight was pricking on the playne. &c. The second day ther came in a Palmer bearing an Infant with bloody hands, whose Parents he complained to have bene slayn by an Enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him some knight, to performe that adventure, which being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same Palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole subject thereof.2 The third day there came in, a Groome who complained before the Faery Queene, that a vile Enchaunter called Busirane had in hand a most faire Lady called Amoretta, whom he kept in most grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her body.Whereupon Sir Scudamour the lover of that Lady presently tooke on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason of the hard Enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but rather as Accidents, then intendments.3 As the love of Britomart, the overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like.4 Thus much Sir, I have briefly overronne to direct your understanding to the welhead of the History, that from thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ye may as in a handfull gripe al the discourse, which otherwise may happily5 seeme tedious and confused. So humbly craving the continuaunce of your honorable favour towards me, and th’eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. 23. January. 1589.6

Yours most humbly affectionate. Ed. Spenser.

1

eftesoones: immediately. This description is at variance with the beginning of Book Two at several points— e.g., the Palmer is already with Guyon when they encounter the bloody baby in Canto One. 2

3

intendments: matters of central import. This description seems to make Scudamour the hero, rather than Britomart. 5 happily: by chance. 6 In the new calendar, 1590. 4

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THE LIFE OF EDMUND SPENSER Spenser (c. 1552–1599) was from a merchant family, possibly involved in the cloth trade and probably living in London. Although he may have been related to the noble family of Spencers, Spenser was not a gentleman. He was fortunate to attend the Merchant Taylors’ School, an academy founded by the tailors’ guild, and was registered there as a “poor scholar.” The school, however, was excellent; in his eight years there, Spenser received a humanist education that was rich in classical scholarship and languages. In 1569 he entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Again he was a scholarship student, called a sizar, earning room and board by performing servants’ duties. In the same year that he arrived at Cambridge, Spenser was first published: several of his translations from Italian and French appeared in the Protestant miscellany A Theatre for Worldlings. Spenser completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1573, and then, in 1576, a Master of Arts (finishing 66th out of a class of 70). Spenser then began a career as secretary to high-ranking men, a position of some importance involving a broad array of duties that included much traveling and writing. Intermittent records show him serving as an emissary for the earl of Leicester, and in 1578 he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. In 1579 he married Maccabaeus Chylde; we know little about the couple’s family life other than the fact that they had two children. In 1580 he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, and traveled there with him. Spenser’s career as a secretary and subsequent work as a civil servant in Ireland no doubt took up much of his time. But he was simultaneously establishing a second career as a poet. Probably while working for Leicester, Spenser met Philip Sidney and entered into his sophisticated literary circle. In 1579 Spenser published The Shepheardes Calendar, his innovative and enormously influential collection of pastorals. It revealed Spenser not only as one of England’s most skilled poets, but as a deeply interested and progressive Protestant thinker. He also cultivated his university friendship with the humanist scholar Gabriel Harvey, which in 1580 led to the publication of several of their letters. The Harvey letters mention several lost works, and suggest that by 1580 Spenser had begun working on The Faerie Queene. Meanwhile, in Ireland with Lord Grey, Spenser participated in the complicated and exceedingly violent project of English colonialism. Grey was sent to govern a country that was struggling broadly against English domination, and he adopted a strategy of overwhelming force, including the notorious slaughter of 600 military prisoners at Smerwick, and policies aimed at subduing the population through famine. To what 229

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extent Spenser participated in Grey’s governance, and to what extent he merely accompanied him and performed secretarial duties, is unclear. But it is clear that Spenser profited personally from empire building. Although Grey was recalled to England in 1582, Spenser made Ireland his permanent home, first in the New Abbey estate, and in 1589 in the three thousand acres of the Kilcolman estate. Throughout the 1580s, Spenser received a number of governmental appointments and established himself in Ireland as a well-off planter and gentleman. His complex relationship to Ireland is largely understood through A View of the Present State of Ireland, a prose dialogue that forthrightly defends Grey’s violent tactics and advocates deeply repressive measures against the Irish. It has called forth both defenses of the poet and declarations of his complicity in the outrages of colonialism. The subtleties of A View cast a similarly complicated light on The Faerie Queene, which was written in Ireland, and reflects its beautiful and pitifully war-torn landscape. In Ireland Spenser became friends with the explorer, author, and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh, who in 1589 traveled with him to England. Probably with the sponsorship of Raleigh, Spenser presented the first three books of The Faerie Queene to Elizabeth, who, by Spenser’s report, was well pleased. Spenser secured the printer William Ponsonby in London, and Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were published in 1590. The poem was a clear effort to win court favor, with a dedication to Elizabeth and as many as seventeen dedicatory sonnets to the major figures in court. As a reward, Spenser was granted a pension of £50 a year for life. Such a position in the patronage system of the day was not unusual, as poetry was commonly used as a means of preferment in court—for noblemen such as Sidney and Raleigh, it was one more personal accomplishment; for those like Spenser who were not noble, it was a way to win social and economic advantages. Spenser, however, maintained skepticism toward court life. In his pastoral “Colin Clouts Come Home Again,” which tells of his and Raleigh’s journey to court, Colin declares that it is no sort of life, For shepheard fit to lead in that same place, Where each one seeks with malice and with strife, To thrust downe other into foule disgrace, Himselfe to raise. (688–92) Spenser returned to Ireland, where he lived, worked, and wrote throughout the 1590s. He published several important poems under the title of Complaints in 1591. In 1594 he married Elizabeth Boyle, resulting

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in at least one child, and in the following year he published Amoretti and Epithalamion, which celebrate their love and marriage. Throughout these years he continued work on The Faerie Queene, and in 1596 published the second edition. This extended the poem to six books; its final form was reached in the posthumous 1609 edition, with the inclusion of the fragment of a seventh book, The Mutabilitie Cantos. In 1596 he also published Fowre Hymnes and Prothalamion. Spenser may have traveled to London to oversee the second printing of The Faerie Queene. If so, he returned to an Ireland wracked by rebellion. In 1598 the Tyrone Rebellion reached Munster, and Spenser and his family fled Kilcolman just before the estate was sacked and burned. Spenser carried letters from the President of Munster to the Privy Council in England, describing the military crisis. On January 13, 1599, while still in England, Spenser died. His life ended under the shadow cast by the destruction of his home and the scattering of his interests in Ireland, which Ben Jonson described, possibly hyperbolically, as dying “for lack of bread.” Spenser’s hearse was reportedly attended by poets, who threw their verses and pens into his tomb as he was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

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TEXTUAL NOTES Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were first published in 1590. They were reprinted, together with Books Four through Six, in 1596, and the whole reprinted again, together with part of Book Seven (the “Cantos of Mutabilitie”), in 1609. The present edition of Book Two is based on the first edition of 1590; the copy text was that of the British Library (UMI 1220:06). All features (spelling, capitalization, punctuation, italics) are retained, except that I have modernized the use of i/j and u/v and have added quotation marks to dialogue. I have also silently expanded abbreviations, ampersands, and diphthongs. An errata page, headed “Faults escaped in the Print,” was included at the end of the 1590 edition; I have incorporated all of the corrections given by this page (abbreviated FE in the apparatus below). I have also collated the text of 1590 with the second edition of 1596 (copy text: Huntington Library, UMI 332:05), adopting readings from the latter when they seemed to correct obvious mistakes or to clear up obscurities. A few readings, mostly involving punctuation and capitalization, are taken from 1609 (copy text: Harvard University Library, UMI 1716:09). In cases where these substitutions alter or affect the meaning of the text, I have noted them below. I have also listed variants from 1596 that were not adopted in the text but seemed substantive or noteworthy. Pr.4.1. Faerie] 1596; faery 1590. Pr.4.6. thou,] 1596; then 1590. i.Arg.2. knight] 1596; kniggt 1590. i.2.7. native] 1590; natives 1596. i.4.6–7. Lines transposed in 1596. i.6.9. Faerie land] 1596; Faryland 1590. i.16.1. liefe] 1596; life 1590. i.18.6. he did] 1590; did he 1596. i.20.7. blotted] 1596; blotting 1590. i.30.2. hither] 1596; hether 1590. i.31.4. on] 1596; one 1590. i.32.7. Must] 1596; Most 1590. i.33.8. thrise] FE; these 1590, 1596. i.39.4. dolour] 1590; labour 1596. i.40.4. gore] 1590; gold 1596. i.44.6. avenging] 1590; revenging 1596.

i.53.9. too] 1596; to 1590. i.56.1. wretch—] this ed.; wretch, 1590, 1596. i.56.2. off] 1596; of 1590. i.59.1. equall] 1590; evill 1596. ii.5.3. hard] 1596; hart 1590. ii.6.9. place to place] FE, 1596; place place 1590. ii.9.1. whose] 1590; those 1596. ii.12.8. fame] 1596; frame 1590. ii.21.1. cald] 1590; calth 1596. ii.23.2. boldly] 1590; bloudy 1596. ii.28.2. their] 1596; her 1590. champions] 1590; champion 1596. ii.30.3. bloodguiltinesse] this ed.; bloodguiltnesse 1590; bloud guiltnesse 1596. ii.31.3. makes] FE, 1596; make 1590. ii.34.9. her] 1590; their 1596.

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Textual Notes ii.37.1. Fast] FE, First 1590, 1596. ii.40.5. peaceably] 1590; peaceable 1596. iii.2.6. raught] FE, 1596; rought 1590. iii.3.7. heard] 1596; hard 1590. iii.4.5. he] 1590; vaine 1596. iii.9.8. flattery] 1596; slattery 1590. iii.11.4. courser] 1596; course 1590. iii.18.6. device] 1590; advise 1596. iii.20.5. greatly] FE, unto 1590; 1596 reads “their haire on end does reare.” iii.27.8. the knots] 1590; their knots 1596. iii.28.1. were] FE, 1596; did 1590. iii.38.4. I have] 1590; have I 1596. iii.42.1. court—] this ed.; court. 1590; court, 1596. iv.Arg.2. Occasion] 1596; occasion 1590. iv.Arg.3. Phaon] 1590; Phedon 1596. iv.Arg.4. strife] 1590, 1596; Strife 1609. iv.10.4. not,] FE; no, 1590, 1596. iv.12.8. tonge] FE; tongue 1590; tong 1596. iv.17.6. wretch] 1590; one 1596. iv.17.8. her guilful trech] 1590; occasion 1596. iv.17.9. wandring ketch] 1590; light upon 1596. iv.36.7. Phaon] 1590; Phedon 1596. iv.41.2. Pyrochles] FE; Pyrrhochles 1590, 1596. iv.45.5. that did] 1590; thus to 1596. v.Arg.2. untyes] 1590; unbinds 1596. v.Arg.3. Who him . . .Atin to] 1590; Of whom sore hurt, for his revenge 1596. v.Arg.4. Cymochles . . . flyes.] 1590; Attin Cymochles findes. 1596. v.5.9. me not much] 1590; not much me 1596.

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v.8.7. hurtle] 1590; hurle, 1596. v.10.7. enemies] 1596; enimye 1590. v.17.8. Occasion] 1596; occasion 1590. v.18.5. emboyling] FE, 1596; embayling 1590. v.19.4. shee] 1609; hee 1590, 1596. v.19.7. garre] 1590; do 1596. v.27.3. her] 1590; his 1596. v.29.5. prickling] 1590; pricking 1596. v.31.5. In Nemus gayned] FE; In Netmus gayned 1590; Gaynd in Nemea 1596. vi.1.7. abstaine] 1590; restraine 1596. vi.1.8. her] 1590; their 1596. vi.3.4. as merry as Pope Jone] 1590; that nigh her breth was gone 1596. vi.3.6. to her might] 1590; might to her 1596. vi.12.9. throwe her sweete smels] 1590; her sweet smels throw 1596. vi.14.9. love] 1590; loud 1596. vi.18.2. worldly] 1596; wordly 1590. vi.18.7. griesy] 1590; griesly 1596. vi.29.2. importune] 1590; importance 1596; important 1609. vi.42.4. stept] 1590; steept 1596. vi.43.7. his] this ed.; but this his 1590 (with but this blotted out); this 1596. vi.45.3. Burning] 1590; But 1596. vi.48.6. man saw,] FE, 1596; man, saw 1590. vi.51.5. fier] 1590; fire too 1596. vii.4.4. yet] 1590; it 1596. vii.4.9. And] 1590; A 1596. vii.7.3. hils] 1590; heapes 1596. vii.11.6. and throw] 1590; throw 1596. vii.12.9. in] 1590; as 1596.

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Textual Notes

vii.18.2. of that antique] 1590; of antique 1596. vii.19.5. bloodguiltinesse] this ed.; bloodguiltnesse 1590; bloud guiltnesse 1596. vii.21.5. internall] 1590; infernall 1596. vii.24.7. nought] 1590; ought 1596. vii.32.6. Mammon] FE, 1596; Hammon 1590. vii.36.4. yron] 1596; dying 1590. vii.37.1. an] 1590; as 1596. vii.40.5. As if that] FE; As if the 1590; As the 1596. vii.40.7. And . . .yron] 1590; But . . . golden 1596. vii.41.3. his] 1590; to 1596. vii.52.6. Which with] 1590, 1596; Which-with 1609. vii.54.8. th’] FE, 1596; the 1590. vii.60.4. more temperate] 1590; intemperate 1596. vii.64.9. his] 1590; the 1596. viii.16.7. tomblacke] 1590; tombblacke 1596. viii.25.1. his cruell] FE; same 1590, 1596. viii.32.2. Pagans] FE, 1596; Pagons 1590. viii.32.6. to ward] 1596; toward 1590. viii.35.8. double] FE, 1596; doubly 1590. viii.40.4. wisely as] 1596; well, as he 1590. viii.44.8. not thore] 1590; no more 1596. viii.45.3. empierst] FE, 1596; empiest 1590. viii.46.8. harrow] FE; Horrow 1590, 1596. viii.48.8. Prince Arthur] 1609; Sir Guyon 1590, 1596.

viii.53.6. Had] 1590; Hast 1596. viii.55.3. bowing] FE; with bowing 1590, 1596. ix.Arg.4. flight] 1590; fight 1596. ix.1.5 indecent] FE, 1596; incedent 1590. ix.6.9. Arthogall] 1590; Arthegall 1596. ix.7.5. Seven times] 1590; Now hath 1596. ix.7.6. Hath walkte] 1590; Walkt round 1596. ix.15.3. Capitaine] 1609; Captaine 1590, 1596. ix.16.8. wind with blustring] 1590; wind blustring 1596. ix.19.9. crowned] FE, 1596; crownd 1590. ix.20.6. Then] 1590; There 1596. ix.21.1. them] 1596; him 1590. ix.21.3. fensible] 1590; sensible 1596. ix.21.7. lenger time] FE, 1596; lenger a time 1590. ix.22.9. diapase] FE; Dyapase 1590, 1596. ix.37.8. your love] 1590, 1596; you love 1609. ix.38.9. three years] 1590; twelve moneths 1596. ix.41.7. Castory.] FE; lastery, 1590; lastery. 1596. ix.42.1. cheare] 1596; cleare 1590. ix.48.3. these] 1596; this 1590. ix.49.9. would] 1590; could 1596. ix.55.9. well is] FE, 1596; welis 1590. ix.57.1. to] 1596; so 1590. x.4.3. Who] FE; whom 1590, 1596. x.4.6. and great] FE, 1596; and thy great 1590. old] FE, 1596; gold 1590. x.5.4. unmannurd] 1590; unmanurd 1596.

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Textual Notes x.6.6. safety] 1590; safeties sake 1596. x.7.7. liveden] 1590; lived then 1596. x.15.9. munificence] 1590; munifience 1596. x.19.5. upon the present floure] 1590; in that impatient stoure 1596. x.20.2. to] 1590; of 1596. x.24.8. Scuith guiridh] 1596; (left blank) 1590. it] 1596; he 1590. x.24.9. rather y Scuith gogh, signe of sad crueltee] 1596; (left blank) 1590. x.26.6. their] FE; her 1590, 1596. x.34.1. Rivall’] 1590; Rivallo 1596. x.34.7. Then his Ambitious] 1590; Till his ambitious 1596. x.37.3. with] 1590; up 1596. x.38.2. of] 1590; or 1596. x.49.8. defrayd] 1590; did defray 1596. x.65.9. have forst] 1590; enforst 1596. x.68.7. seemed] 1590; seemeth 1596. xi.9.9. against that Bulwarke lent] 1590; that Bulwarke sorely rent 1596. xi.10.2. assignment] 1590; dessignment 1596. xi.13.2. ferce] 1590; fierce 1596. is] 1590; was 1596. xi.13.5. assayed] 1590; assayled 1596. xi.18.1. therewithall] 1590; therewith all 1596. xi.23.8. support] 1590; disport 1596.

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xi.27.5. But] 1590; Who 1596. xi.30.7. Britayne] FE; Britom 1590; Briton 1596. xi.30.9. survive] FE; revive 1590, 1596. xi.32.5. infest] 1590; unrest 1596. xi.44.3. this] FE, 1596; his 1590. xii.Arg.1. through] 1590; by 1596. xii.Arg.2. through passing] 1590; passing through 1596. xii.1.6. that brave] FE; this brave 1590, 1596 [the FE emendation is unspecific]. xii.3.9. doe] FE; did 1590; do 1596. xii.8.6. wayting] FE; weiting 1590; waiting 1596. xii.13.9. temple] 1590; honor 1596. xii.17.1. Phaedria] this ed.; Phoedria 1590, 1596. xii.21.1. th’earnest] 1590; th’heedfull 1596. xii.23.6. Hydraes] 1596; Hydres 1590. xii.32.4. That] 1590; Thou 1596. xii.39.8. upstaring] 1590; upstarting 1596. xii.48.7. of this] 1596; oft his 1590. xii.51.1. Therewith] 1590; Thereto 1596. xii.61.8. fearefully] 1590; tenderly 1596. xii.75.5. Lady’] 1590; Ladie 1596. xii.81.4. that] 1590; the 1596. xii.83.7. spoyle] 1590; spoyld 1596.

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GLOSSARY abuse: Deceive.

cace: State.

advize, avize: Consider.

carriage: Bearing, deportment.

aguizd: Dressed, equipped, set out.

cast: Try, attempt, choose. caytive: Captive, slave, wretch, wretched.

albe, albee, all be: Although. algate: Altogether, nevertheless, at all costs.

certes: Certainly, indeed.

amenage: See menage.

conge: Leave, farewell.

approved: Proven, tested.

corse: Corpse, body.

aread: See rede.

courser: Horse.

assay: Assail, attempt, trial, adventure.

cunning: Skillful.

close: Hidden, secret.

decay: Death, destruction.

avized: Wary, careful.

despight: Hatred, insult, crime, wrong, disdain.

ay, aye: Ever, forever, always. bace, base: Ordinary, lowly. bad: Bade, commanded.

dight, bedight: Equip, prepare, decked, arrayed, adorned.

bale, baleful: Evil, woeful.

disdain: Scorn, indignation.

band: Bond.

disease: Trouble, discomfort, distress.

bark: Boat, ship.

dismay: Daunt, defeat, overcome, kill.

bedight: See dight. bend: Aim.

do, doe: Make, cause.

bestad, bestead, bested: Situated.

doughtie: Brave, valorous.

betide: Befall, befallen.

earst: Before, earlier.

blend, blent: Blind, blinded.

eft: Then, next.

blott: Shame, fault.

eftsoones: Soon, immediately.

boots: Helps, profits, serves.

eke: Also.

bord, boord: Approach, address.

emprize: Enterprise, adventure, undertaking.

bounty: Generosity, goodness.

engine: Plot, trick, instrument, weapon.

brond: Firebrand, torch, sword.

ensample: Example. 236

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Glossary

237

faine: Feign, dissemble, wish, willingly, gladly.

meed: Reward.

fell: Cruel, harsh, fierce. flood: River.

menage, amenage: Manage, control (especially a horse).

fond: Foolish.

mickle: Mighty, much, great.

forlore, forlorn: Lost, left behind.

mischief: Trouble, misdeed.

for thy: Therefore.

no’te, note: Cannot, could not, know not.

frame: Adjust, order, deploy, structure. froward: Adverse, contrary, perverse, away from. gan: Began, did. gent, gentle: Noble, knightly.

meet: Proper, decorous, fitting.

mote: Might.

offend, offense: Harm. ought: Aught, anything. painted: Decorated, colorful. pap: Breast.

gin: See engine.

passing: Extremely, surpassingly.

guerdon: Reward.

Paynim: Pagan.

guise: Manner, way, appearance.

perce, persant: Pierce, piercing.

hap: Chance, circumstance.

perdy: Indeed, by God.

heare: Hair. heavy, heaviness: Sad, sadness.

perforce: With force, by necessity.

hent: Took, took up, seized.

perlous: Perilous.

hew: Appearance.

playn, playnt: Complain, complaint.

hight: Is called. issue, issew: Offspring. jarre: Jar, discord. ken, kend: Know, knew. kynd: Nature. lay: Song, poem.

pleasaunce: Pleasure, pleasantness, bower. portaunce: Bearing. pricke: Ride, gallop. prove: Test, try.

liefe: Dear.

puissance, puissant: Power, powerful.

light, lightly: Quick, quickly, easily.

raught: Reached, fetched, handed.

list, lust: Desire.

reave, reft: Take/took/taken away.

maister: Master, conquer.

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Glossary

recure: Recover, restore.

swaine: Person, young man.

rede, aread: Tell, make known, know, consider (past tense: red, read).

swinck: Toil, work.

redoubted: Famed, feared. remorse: Pity.

teene: Woe, sorrow, anguish. tho: Though, then. thrall: Captive, bind, enslave. thrill: Pierce.

renowmed: Renowned.

tract: Trace.

rew, ruth: Pity, sorrow.

troth: Truth, faith.

rife: Very much, utterly, thorough.

uncouth: Unknown, unfamiliar, wild.

rowme: Room. rude: Wild, uncouth.

uneath, uneathes: Uneasily, scarcely, hardly, with difficulty.

sad: Sober, serious.

varlet: Servant, squire, rascal.

seely, silly: Helpless, innocent.

villein: Villain, rascal, peasant.

sell: Saddle.

want: Lack.

shend, shent: Shame, shamed.

warray: Wage war on.

shew: Show.

wax, wex: Grow, become (past tense: wox).

sith: Since. smart: Pain, suffer. spright: Spirit. stay: Wait, await, stop.

weed: Garment. weene: Believe, think, consider. weete, wote: Know, knew.

stead, sted: Place.

whyleare, whylome: Earlier, formerly.

sterne, sternesse: Fierce, fierceness.

wight: Person.

stiffe, stiffly: Strong, strongly, vigorously.

wist: Knew.

stint: Stop, cease.

wise: Way, manner. wonne: Live, dwell, dwelling.

stout: Strong, bold.

wont: Custom, habit, tend, be used to.

stowre: Time of distress, peril, turmoil, attack.

wood: Mad.

strait: Immediately. suffer: Permit, allow. sway: Might, force, wield.

wreak: Revenge. yield: Grant, give. ywis: Certainly.

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INDEX OF CHARACTERS The appearances of characters in Book Two are listed by canto and stanza; their appearances in other books are listed, in parentheses, by book and canto. For a full descriptive index, see Shohachi Fukuda’s “The Characters of The Faerie Queene” (in Hamilton, 2001). Acrasia, i.51–52; xii.72–84 Alma, ix.17–60; x.77; xi.2, 16, 49 Alma’s watchman, ix.11–12 Amavia, i.35–61 Archimago, i.1–25; iii.11–19; vi.47–51; viii.10–56 (I.i–iii, vi,

vii–ix passim (unconscious viii.1–52); x.70–77; xi.3–4; xii passim (III.i, iv; V.iii)

Huddibras, ii.17–46 Impatience and Impotence, xi.23–31, 47 Maleger, xi.20–46 Mammon, vii.3–66 Medina, ii.14–46; iii.2 Mortdant (Mordant), i.41–61 Occasion, iv.4–46; v.19–22 Palmer, i.7–61; ii.1–12; iii.3; iv passim; v.24–25; vi.19; viii.3–56; xi.3–4; xii.3–87 (III.i) Perissa, ii.16–46 Phaedria, vi.3–38; xii.14–17 Phaon (Phedon), iv.3–36 Philotime, vii.44–50 Pilate, vii.61–62 Praysdesire, ix.36–39 Pyrochles, v.2–23; vi.41–51; viii.10–52 Redcrosse, i.24–34 (I.i–ii, iv–v, vii–xii;

xii; III.iv)

Arthur, viii.17–56; ix passim; x.68–69, 77; xi.16–49 (I.vii–ix; III.i, iv–v; IV.vii–ix; V.viii–xi; VI.v–viii)

Arthur’s squire, viii.17; ix.11; xi.17, 29–31, 48–49 (I.vii–viii; III.i, iv–v; IV.vii–viii; VI.v–viii)

Atin, iv.37–46; v.25–38; vi.2–4, 38–51; viii.10, 56 Belphoebe, iii.21–42 (III.v–vi; IV.vii–viii)

Boatman, xi.4, xii.3–38 Braggadocchio, iii.4–46 (III.viii, x; IV.iv–v; V.iii)

Cymochles, v.25–38; vi.2–36; viii.10–45 Duessa, i.13–22 (I.ii, iv–v, vii–viii,

III.i–iv)

Ruddymane, i.40–61; ii.1–12, 44–46; iii.2 Sansloy, ii.18–46 (I.iii, vi) Shamefastness, ix.40–43 (IV.x) Tantalus, vii.57–60 Timias, see “Arthur’s squire” Trompart, iii.6–46 (III.viii, x; V.iii) Verdant, xii.72–84

xii; IV.i, xi; V.ix)

Elissa, ii.16–46 Ferryman, see “Boatman” Furor, iv.3–46; v.19–23 Gryll, xii.86–87 Guardian angel, viii.3–8 Guyon, i–ii passim; iii.1–3; iv passim; v.2–25; vi.19–40;

239

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BIBLIOGRAHY I. Editions and Reference Works Brooks-Davies, Douglas. Spenser’s Faerie Queene: A critical commentary on Books I and II. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1977. Greenlaw, Edwin, ed. The Works of Edmund Spenser:A Variorum Edition.Vol. 2. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins, 1933. Hamilton, A. C., ed. Essential articles for the study of Edmund Spenser. Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1972. –––––, ed. The Faerie Queene. London: Longman, 2001. Hamilton, A. C., et al., eds. The Spenser Encyclopedia. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990. Kellogg, Robert, and Oliver Steele, eds. Books I and II of The Faerie Queene. New York: Odyssey Press, 1965. Kitchin, G. W., ed. Book II of The Faery Queene. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1887. Maclean, Hugh, and Anne Lake Prescott, eds. Edmund Spenser’s Poetry. 3rd ed. New York: Norton, 1993. Roche, Thomas P., Jr., with C. Patrick O’Donnell, Jr., eds. The Faerie Queene. Harmondsworth, U.K.: Penguin, 1978. Spenser, Edmund. A View of the State of Ireland. Edited by Andrew Hadfield and Willy Maley. Oxford: Blackwell, 1997. Winstanley, Lilian, ed. The Faerie Queene, Book II. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914.

II. Critical Works Anderson, Judith. “The Knight and the Palmer in The Faerie Queene, Book II.” Modern Language Quarterly 31 (1970): 160–78. –––––. “‘Myn Auctour’: Spenser’s Enabling Fiction and Eumnestes’ ‘Immortall Scrine’.” In Unfolded Tales: Essays on Renaissance Romance. Edited by George M. Logan and Gordon Teskey. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989, 16–31. Baker, David J. Between Nations: Shakespeare, Spenser, Marvell, and the Question of Britain. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1997. Berger, Harry. The Allegorical Temper:Vision and Reality in Book II of Spenser’s Faerie Queene. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1957. Black, Lynette C. “Prudence in Book II of The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 13 (1999): 65–88. Broaddus, James W. “Renaissance Psychology and the Defense of Alma’s Castle.” Spenser Studies 19 (2004): 135–57.

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Brooke, N. S. “C. S. Lewis and Spenser: Nature, Art, and the Bower of Bliss.” Cambridge Journal 2 (1945): 420–34. Reprinted in Hamilton, Essential Articles, 13–28. Burrow, Colin. Edmund Spenser. Plymouth: Northcote House, 1996. Carscallen, James. “The Goodly Frame of Temperance: The Metaphor of Cosmos in The Faerie Queene, Book II.” University of Toronto Quarterly 37 (1968): 136–55. Reprinted in Hamilton, Essential Articles, 347–65. Christian, Margaret. “‘The Ground of Storie’: Genealogy in The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 9 (1988): 61–79. Cooney, Helen. “Guyon and His Palmer: Spenser’s Emblem of Temperance.” Review of English Studies 51 (2000): 169–92. Crossley, Brian, and Paul Edwards. “Spenser’s Bawdy: A Note on The Faerie Queene II vi.” Papers on Language and Literature 9 (1973): 314–9. Cullen, Patrick. “Guyon Microchristus: The Cave of Mammon Re-examined.” ELH 37 (1970): 153–74. Dauber, Antoinette. “The Art of Veiling in the Bower of Bliss.” Spenser Studies 1 (1980): 163–75. Davis, Walter. “The Houses of Mortality in Book II of The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 2 (1981): 121–40. Digby, Sir Kenelm. Observations on the 22. Stanza in the 9th Canto of the 2d. Book of Spencers Faery Queen. London: 1644. Reprinted in Greenlaw, Variorum, 472–8. Dillon, Grace. “Mocking Imperialism: A Lively Hyperbolical Amplification in Spenser’s Faerie Queene.” Renaissance Papers (1998): 19–28. Durling, Robert. “The Bower of Bliss and Armida’s Palace.” Comparative Literature 6 (1954): 335–47. Reprinted in Hamilton, Essential Articles, 113–24. Esolen, Anthony. “Spenser’s ‘Alma Venus’: Energy and Economics in the Bower of Bliss.” English Literary Renaissance 23 (1993): 267–86. Farmer, Norman. “The World’s New Body: Spenser’s Faerie Queene Book II, St. Paul’s Epistles and Reformation England.” In Renaissance Culture in Context: Theory and Practice. Edited by Jean R. Brink and William Gentrup. Aldershot: Ashgate, 1993, 75–85. Fisher, James R. “Certaine Signes of the Zodiac: The Shape of Spenser’s Allegory in Book II of The Faerie Queene.” Constructions 8 (1993): 9–35. Fowler, Alastair. “Emblems of Temperance in The Faerie Queene, Book II.” Review of English Studies 11 (1960): 143–49. –––––. “The Image of Mortality: The Faerie Queene II i–ii.” Huntington Library Quarterly 24 (1961): 91–110. Reprinted in Hamilton, Essential Articles, 139–52. –––––. Spenser and the Numbers of Time. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1964. Gohlke, Madelson. “Embattled Allegory: Book II of The Faerie Queene.” English Literary Renaissance 8 (1978): 123–40.

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Greenblatt, Stephen. “To Fashion a Gentleman: Spenser and the Destruction of the Bower of Bliss.” In Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980, 157–92. Greene, Roland. “A Primer of Spenser’s World-Making: Alterity in the Bower of Bliss.” In Worldmaking Spenser: Explorations in the Early Modern Age. Edited by Patrick Cheney and Lauren Silberman. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2000, 9–31. Hamilton, A. C. “A Theological Reading of The Faerie Queene II.” ELH 25 (1958): 155–62. Harper, Carrie A. The Sources of the British Chronicle History in Spenser’s Faerie Queene. Philadelphia: Bryn Mawr, 1910. Hieatt, A. Kent. “A Numerical Key for Spenser’s Amoretti and Guyon in the House of Mammon.” Year in English Studies 3 (1973): 14–27. –––––. “Three Fearful Symmetries and the Meaning of Faerie Queene II.” In A Theatre for Spenserians. Edited by Judith M. Kennedy and James A. Reither. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1973, 19–52. Hutson, Lorna. “Chivalry for Merchants; or, Knights of Temperance in the Realms of Gold.” Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 26 (1996): 29–59. Kaske, Carol V. “‘Religious reuerance doth buriall teene’: Christian and Pagan in The Faerie Queene, II.i-ii.” Review of English Studies 30 (1979): 129–43. King, Andrew. “Lines of Authority: The Genealogical Theme in The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 18 (2003): 59–77. Koller, Kathrine. “The Travayled Pylgrime by Stephen Batman and Book Two of The Faerie Queene.” Modern Language Quarterly 3 (1942): 535–41. Krier, Theresa. “Psychic Deadness in Allegory: Spenser’s House of Mammon and Attacks on Linking.” In Imagining Death in Spenser and Milton. Edited by Elizabeth J. Bellamy, Patrick Cheney, and Michael Schoenfeldt. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003, 46–64. Lewis, C. S. The Allegory of Love:A Study in Medieval Tradition. London: Oxford, 1936. Section pertaining to Book Two reprinted in Hamilton, Essential Articles, 3–12. MacLachlan, Hugh. “The ‘carelesse heavens’: A Study of Revenge and Atonement in The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 1 (1980): 135–61. –––––. “The Death of Guyon and the Elizabethan Book of Homilies.” Spenser Studies 4 (1984): 93–114. Magill, A. J. “Spenser’s Guyon and the Mediocrity of the Elizabethan Settlement.” Studies in Philology (1970): 167–77. Mazzola, Elizabeth. “‘Most Strong in Most Infirmitee’: Ritual Sequences and Consequences in The Faerie Queene Book II.” Lamar Journal of the Humanities 20 (1994): 5–25.

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Schoendfeldt, Michael. “The Construction of Inwardness in The Faerie Queene, Book 2.” In Worldmaking Spenser: Explorations in the Early Modern Age. Edited by Patrick Cheney and Lauren Silberman. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2000, 234–43. Silberman, Lauren. “The Faerie Queene, Book II and the Limitations of Temperance.” Modern Language Studies 17 (1987): 9–22. Sirluck, Ernest. “Milton Revises The Faerie Queene.” Modern Philology 48 (1950): 90–6. Snyder, Susan. “Guyon the Wrestler.” Renaissance News 14 (1961): 249–52. Stambler, Peter. “The Development of Guyon’s Christian Temperance.” ELH 7 (1977): 51–81. Strauss, Paul. “Allegory and the Bower of Bliss.” Ben Jonson Journal 2 (1995): 59–71. Summit, Jennifer. “Monuments and Ruins: Spenser and the Problem of the English Library.” ELH 70 (2003): 1–34. Suttie, Paul. “Moral Ambivalence in the Legend of Temperance.” Spenser Studies 19 (2004): 125–33. Taylor, Barry. “Armour, Flows and Bliss: Liquefactions of Gender in The Faerie Queene, Book II.” In The Body in Late Medieval and Early Modern Culture. Edited by Darryll Grantley and Nina Taunton. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000, 33–49. Tonkin, Humphrey. “Discussing Spenser’s Cave of Mammon.” Studies in English Literature 13 (1973): 1–13. Wall, John. “‘Fruitfullest Virginia’: Edmund Spenser, Roanoke Island, and the Bower of Bliss.” Renaissance Papers (1984): 1–17. –––––. “Orion’s Flaming Head: Spenser’s Faerie Queene, II.ii.46 and the Feast of the Twelve Days of Christmas.” Spenser Studies 7 (1987): 93–101. –––––. “Orion Once More: Revisiting the Sky over Faerieland.” Spenser Studies 8 (1990): 331–34. Webster, John. “Challenging the Commonplace: Teaching as Conversation in Spenser’s Legend of Temperance.” In Approaches to Teaching Spenser’s ‘Faerie Queene.’ Edited by David Lee Miller and Alexander Dunlop. New York: Modern Language Association of America, 1994, 82–92. Wheatley, Chloe. “Abridging the Antiquitee of Faery lond: New Paths through Old Matter in The Faerie Queen.” Renaissance Quarterly 58 (2005): 857–80. Williams, Grant. “Phantastes’s Flies: The Trauma of Amnesic Enjoyment in Spenser’s Memory Palace.” Spenser Studies 18 (2003): 231–52. Yim, Sung-Kyun. “‘Thy Temperance Invincible’: Humanism in Book II of The Faerie Queene and Paradise Regained.” Early Modern Literary Studies: A Journal of Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century English Literature 9.1 (2003).

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The Faerie Queene from Hackett Publishing Company General Editor, Abraham Stoll Spenser’s great work in five volumes. Each includes its own Introduction, annotation, notes on the text, bibliography, glossary, and index of characters; Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh” and a short Life of Edmund Spenser appear in every volume.

Book Two Edited, with Introduction, by Erik Gray, Columbia University Books Three and Four Edited, with Introduction, by Dorothy Stephens, University of Arkansas Book Five Edited, with Introduction, by Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego

Edmund Spenser

The

Faerie Queene Books Three and Four

BOOKS THREE AND FOUR

Book One Edited, with Introduction, by Carol V. Kaske, Cornell University

The Faerie Queene

These paired Arthurian legends suggest that erotic desire and the desire for companionship undergird national politics. The maiden Britomart, Queen Elizabeth’s fictional ancestor, dons armor to search for a man whom she has seen in a crystal ball. While on this quest, she seeks to understand how one can be chaste while pursuing a sexual goal, in love with a man while passionately attached to a woman, a warrior princess yet a wife. As Spenser’s most sensitively developed character, Britomart is capable of heroic deeds but also of teenage self-pity. Her experience is anatomized in the stories of other characters, where versions of love and friendship include physical gratification, torture, mutual aid, competition, spiritual ecstasy, self-sacrifice, genial teasing, jealousy, abduction, wise government, sedition, and the valiant defense of a pig shed.

SPENSER

The Faerie Queene, Books Three and Four

Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos Edited, with Introduction, by Andrew Hadfield, University of Sussex

90000

Edited, with Introduction, by

FnL1 00 0000

9 780872 208551

HACKETT

ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-855-1 ISBN-10: 0-87220-855-9

0855

DOROTHY STEPHENS

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Books Three and Four

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Books Three and Four

Edited, with Introduction, by

Dorothy Stephens Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. Indianapolis/Cambridge

Copyright © 2006 by Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved 09 08 07 06

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

For further information, please address Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 44937 Indianapolis, IN 46244-0937 www.hackettpublishing.com Cover art: Walter Crane illustration and ornament for Book Three, The Faerie Queene, ca. 1890. Cover design by Abigail Coyle Interior design by Elizabeth Wilson Composition by Professional Book Compositors Printed at Edwards Brothers, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spenser, Edmund, 1552?–1599. The faerie queene / Edmund Spenser. p. cm. Series general editor, Abraham Stoll; volume editors: bk. 1, Carol Kaske; bk. 5, Abraham Stoll. Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-87220-808-7 (bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-807-9 (pbk. : bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-802-8 (bk. 5) — ISBN 0-87220-801-X (pbk. : bk. 5) 1. Knights and knighthood—Poetry. 2. Epic poetry, English. 3. Virtues —Poetry. I. Stoll, Abraham Dylan, 1969– . II. Kaske, Carol V., 1933– . III. Title.

PR2358.A3K37 2006 821'.3—dc22 2005026668 ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-856-8 (cloth, bks. 3 & 4) 978-0-87220-855-1 (pbk., bks. 3 & 4) ISBN-10: 0-87220-856-7 (cloth, bks. 3 & 4) 0-87220-855-9 (pbk., bks. 3 & 4) eISBN: 978-1-60384-041-5 (e-book)

CONTENTS Introduction

vii

The Faerie Queene, Book Three

1

The Faerie Queene, Book Four

245

The Letter to Raleigh The Life of Edmund Spenser Textual Notes Glossary Index of Characters Works Cited

451 455 458 464 472 475

v

For Wesley and Annette Stephens, who know the pleasure of a good detour.

INTRODUCTION

1. Domesticity and Strangeness In her private journals, written between 1798 and 1803, Dorothy Wordsworth frequently mentions sitting at the fireside in Dove Cottage with her brother to read Spenser’s poetry aloud. Some mornings they walked in the orchard reading cantos of The Faerie Queene. For them, Spenser was a domestic practice, and the sound of his poetry was that of their own voices, even though the poetry that William Wordsworth wrote hardly resembled Spenser’s. Edmund Spenser lived more than two hundred years before the Wordsworths, during the English Renaissance, and he participated in a reflowering of English literature that included Marlowe, Shakespeare, Donne, Wroth, Jonson, Marvell, and Milton. Spenser’s poetry strongly influenced his contemporaries and many writers who came afterward; Shakespeare borrowed from him, and Milton considered him a great moral teacher. (Milton admired him for his understanding that the willful ignorance of sin does not enable an intelligent embrace of goodness.) Two centuries later, the musicality of Spenser’s verse exerted a powerful pull, not only on the Wordsworths, but also on other Romantic poets: Keats, Shelley, and Byron. But the Romantics had a passion for Shakespeare, as well, and it is with the latter passion that modern readers are more likely to feel a kinship. Because modern readers grow up hearing Shakespeare’s plays quoted and then begin to read them in high school, we have at least the illusion that Shakespeare belongs to us. It is easy to imagine Dorothy and William Wordsworth reading Shakespeare by firelight; he is familiar, and he tells us who we are. The fact that this domestic Shakespeare is, to a great degree, a figment of our own imaginations— that the more carefully one looks at him, the stranger he becomes—does not impair our gut-level sense that he speaks our anxieties, desires, and hopes. In contrast, few modern readers grow up with Spenser. His strangeness—the distance between his thought processes and ours—is obvious, and it takes longer to fall in love with him than with Shakespeare. Once one begins to love Spenser, however, the process is irreversible, and his incontrovertible strangeness turns out to be one of his greatest assets. The Faerie Queene is far from what most readers of the past two hundred years have expected of narration. Spenser’s romance epic is not realistic: only a few of its characters have any psychological depth, and the vii

viii

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most extensively developed character silently disappears three-fourths of the way through the poem. The six virtues illustrated by the six books are defined in ways that seem odd to modern minds. The poem’s plots have several beginnings but no endings; there is no central crisis or dénouement; and, indeed, plot progression is secondary to almost everything else. Spenser’s narrator positively glories in repetition at every level: not only do characters re-enact each other’s stories, but they re-enact their own discoveries as though having forgotten the previous pages. Even the sentence structure and diction are repetitive, unabashedly indulging in double or triple negatives, redundant adjectives, and self-quotation. To put a cap on it, when the author expresses his political opinions, they are as likely as not to be hotly contested by modern readers. His notions about the benefits of military suppression in Ireland make us cringe, and the poem declares more than once that the ideal woman is one who keeps her eyes fastened modestly on the ground. Yet we read and learn from this poem precisely for all of the above reasons, intrigued by the knowledge that through poetry we can encounter a culture that had expectations, assumptions, and needs oddly different from our own. While acknowledging that we will never be able to understand Spenser or the Elizabethans fully, we can take steps in that direction. In the process, we may have the beneficial experience of looking back at our own culture only to find that it, too, has become strange and wonderful to us, no longer seeming purely inevitable and natural. So, for instance, we may become attuned to the fact that when we call a modern film, novel, or sculpture “realistic,” we are heavily influenced by our own culture as to what makes a piece of art deserve that adjective. We are quite likely to consider a film realistic even though each of the rooms being filmed has only three sides, large blocks of time are skipped in the course of the story, and no actress in the film has pores. We are trained to overlook these anomalies. But if various cultures achieve artistic realism along various routes, it is even more important to realize that realism has not been the goal of most artists throughout history. Indeed, although a modern reader might criticize Elizabethan literature for being unrealistic, our own culture’s art aims for realism only fitfully. At some level, we know that flagrantly artificial musical lyrics or science-fiction stories may uncover deep truths about the pain of erotic rejection, desire, ambition, or prejudice, conveying these in ways that realism cannot. Elizabethans admired artificially and intricately patterned surfaces. This does not mean they were more psychologically superficial than we are today; their interest in emblematization and allegory demonstrates their recognition that surfaces inevitably carry meaning. Instead of believing

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that surfaces merely conceal inner truth, they believed that we construct ourselves through our manipulation of surfaces. For example, if I dress in a certain way, I am making myself into the sort of person who dresses that way. Elizabethan artists and audiences were astutely aware that the human mind addresses the problems in our lives by means of emblems, metaphors, analogies, transferences, hypothetical thought experiments, and evasions that are anything but simple representations of what goes on in the world outside the mind. In fact, one could say that the average human mind produces an almost constant stream of allegory; that is, it weaves incoming bits of data into large and highly symbolic patterns. Neuroscientists and psychologists tell us that without this ability to allegorize and to construct patterns out of chaotic data, we human beings would be unable to perform many of the simplest intellectual operations and would have little sense of ourselves. One type of artifice that may cause trouble for the modern reader of Elizabethan literature is repetition. Although the high rate of repetition in Elizabethan poetry is foreign to us, much of our music today is actually more repetitious than any music produced during Elizabeth’s reign. We can learn a great deal about both Spenser’s contemporaries and ourselves by noticing that what we might find tiresomely iterative, they found invigorating, and vice versa. Their appetite for repetition centered upon the written and spoken word, as they developed hundreds of ways to vary each literary theme and sound. When we read Spenser’s entire canto devoted to the names and descriptions of rivers, we should ask ourselves seriously, rather than scathingly, what made this canto so admirably alive for its first audiences. We might remind ourselves that nature itself, at the most basic cellular and atomic levels, is highly invested in repetition. It is no wonder that every society that has ever existed on this planet has developed artistic forms in which to mimic, interpret, and ornament this natural investment. At the same time, like many other remarkable works of literature, Spenser’s romance epic is wonderfully inconsistent—which is another way of saying that it looks at every problem from multiple perspectives and gives voice to counter-arguments. So, for example, Spenser’s frequently invoked image of the perfect woman as being modest and retiring finds a counter-argument in Britomart, the heroine of Book Three, who dons armor and goes on a quest to find her beloved, a man whom she has seen only in a crystal ball. Britomart is the Knight of Chastity, yet she does not fit the common sixteenth-century ideal of a chaste woman as someone who does not feel erotic desire before marriage. These inconsistencies cannot easily be smoothed over by saying that Spenser “really” wants women to be like Britomart, rather than like the shy and blushing paragons

x

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described elsewhere. Book Four introduces new inconsistencies, not the least of which is that its tenth canto retroactively changes the happily erotic union of Scudamour and Amoret at the end of Book Three into the result of an unwilling abduction. The poem’s many faces represent its grappling seriously with difficult issues, and we will sell our reading experience short if we try to find one face that represents Spenser’s point of view––or, on the other hand, if we settle for the lazy interpretation that the author is equally comfortable with all possibilities. A richer reading experience will result from the recognition that the poem often generates its own criticism, asking us to explore our political discomforts (as, for example, our discomfort with violence against politically disenfranchised groups). Like the rest of us, Spenser lived and moved in multiple contexts, each with its own discourse, its own mode of organizing ideas into speech. These contexts include those of the family, local and national governments, church, academia, and so on. Even the least literary of us must continually debate with ourselves how we can pass from one context to another while maintaining the illusion of internal consistency, and how we can reconcile the ideals of each context with those of the others—despite the fact that each of these contexts itself undergoes constant change. We read Spenser, then, because his political and social questioning is genuinely complex and because he allows his text to make room, at least momentarily, for opinions that the poem as a whole does not openly espouse. In our less idealistic age, we can appreciate Spenser’s recognition—whether it was conscious or not—that the most productive questions are those that can never be definitively answered, only approached from various angles. We read this epic because of its straightfaced sense of humor, often cast as self-irony—as when its narrator apologizes to one of his characters for continuing to invent an agonizing plot for her (IV.i.1). We read Spenser because of his superb ear, which transforms potentially awkward anachronisms into some of the most richly gorgeous verse ever written in English. We read him for his creation of a vast new mythological system that helped to reclaim the Arthurian genre for Arthur’s self-proclaimed descendants, after France and Italy had appropriated the Briton hero in the Middle Ages. And we read him because, once we have become accustomed to the fact that his narrative does not have the same aims or methods that novels have, we find that he tells very good stories indeed.

2. Faerie Land The Faerie Queene is set in the early Medieval period, roughly around the time of the fifth century, when the legendary King Arthur is still a

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prince. In other words, Spenser writes about a dim and distant past, although he envisions some of the characters in that past as ancestors of Elizabeth Tudor and often uses his “antique” characters to comment upon current events in the sixteenth century. Spenser does not envision his fairies as diminutive creatures with gossamer wings; rather, they are creatures who look precisely like humans but who have limited supernatural powers. They move freely between Britain and Faerie Land, and they interact freely with the human characters. Like the humans, too, they are quite likely to wear chain mail of a design obsolete in Spenser’s own time. As outlined in “The Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser originally intended to link the individual plots of twelve books with an overarching plot device centered upon Gloriana, the Faerie Queen herself, who would represent glory and, more specifically, Queen Elizabeth. Spenser would barely have been able to remember any monarch other than Queen Elizabeth, given that she ascended the throne in 1558 when he was about six years old and was still ruling when he died in 1599. By the time Spenser wrote The Faerie Queene, Elizabeth had become an icon of English national identity and colonial ambition, topics that Spenser addresses throughout his epic. In “The Letter to Raleigh,” however, Spenser explains that he will also allegorize Elizabeth’s more personal side in the character of Belphoebe. He sets forth the poem’s intended structure: the Faerie Queen will send twelve of her worthy knights, representing twelve moral virtues, on twelve quests, each of which will occupy a separate book of the poem. Prince Arthur, who is not a member of Gloriana’s court but who falls in love with her image when he sees her in a ravishing dream, will appear in every book. He will represent magnificence, a perfect combination of all twelve virtues. Implicitly, but powerfully, “The Letter to Raleigh” reveals that the poem will investigate the talents and virtues that are conducive to personal ambition—a subject that will bring national and personal interests warily together. Spenser completed only six of the projected twelve books, though many modern scholars believe that, by the end of Book Six, he had said what he wanted to say. Some aspects of the plot that he outlines in “The Letter to Raleigh” never materialize. Most important, the Faerie Queen herself never appears, and although she is mentioned now and then by the characters, the poem’s various adventures neither center upon her rhetorically nor seem dependent upon her rule within the plot. Richard Helgerson observes, “The Faerie Queene, unlike Gerusalemme Liberata [Tasso’s epic], allows no place for the representation of a powerfully centralized and absolutist governmental order. It acknowledges and celebrates a sovereign lady, but it grants a high degree of autonomy to

xii

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individual knights and their separate pursuits, represents power as relatively isolated and dispersed” (48). This decentralizing is foreshadowed in “The Letter to Raleigh” when Spenser writes, “The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline.” Whereas Machiavelli, Castiglione, and Elyot write manuals for the fashioning of princes and courtiers, Spenser privileges the “gentleman,” whose rank includes those like himself, with no claim to aristocracy. Despite his longing for a place at court, he is also invested in strengthening power and prestige at the margins of Elizabethan government.

3. How to Read the Poem a.

Making Sense of the Grammar

As foreign as it is to the English that we speak and write today, Spenser’s language is mostly modern. Modern English begins in the late Medieval and early Renaissance periods, rather than in the historical period known as Modern (i.e., the twentieth century to the present). The transition from Medieval to Modern English, during which the pronunciation of long vowels radically changed and verb forms continued to simplify, occurred primarily in the fifteenth century, after Chaucer and before Spenser or Shakespeare. Yet because Spenser admired Chaucer, and because Spenser joined other Elizabethan writers in believing that specific word forms carried inherent meaning, he consciously made the experiment of including in his epic many Medieval words and phrases. These make his poetry sound deceptively older than Shakespeare’s in some ways, even though both writers participated in the late-sixteenth-century proliferation of genres and redefinition of an artist as someone with a personal claim to individual fame. Nonetheless, Spenser’s sentence structure is actually simpler and more straightforward than that of Shakespeare, Donne, or Milton, and it is not difficult to figure out his basic meaning. When in doubt about a specific word, the reader can usually simply pronounce it aloud, trying out several vowel sounds: when heard, “reskew” resolves itself into “rescue,” “gard” becomes “guard,” and “ribbands” are easily identifiable as “ribbons.” Mentally substituting i for y when a word does not at first make sense can also solve the problem: “yrke” turns out to mean “irk.” Elizabethans did not identify possessives with apostrophes, so some words that appear plural are actually possessive, as in the phrase “my Soveraines brest” (III.Proem.1). Although Elizabethans did not use quotation marks, they have been added to this volume. It is helpful to

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remember that a Renaissance writer could occasionally set up a useful ambiguity by making readers momentarily unaware that third-person narration had switched to first-person dialogue. Milton uses the technique brilliantly when his speaker’s complaint changes imperceptibly into God’s comforting words in the sonnet “When I consider how my light is spent.” The editors of this series have judged, however, that the readers of this volume of Spenser’s poetry will be aided more than they will be misled by the addition of quotation marks. In Elizabethan English, transitive verbs may follow objective nouns. Thus, “that formost matrone me did blame” indicates that the matron blamed “me” (IV.x.54). An adverb may sound like an adjective: “A bevie of fayre damzels close did lye” means “A bevy of fair damsels did lie closely” (IV.x.48). Spenser’s double negatives act as intensifiers rather than canceling each other out: “never none” means “really and truly never any,” and triple negatives simply up the ante. If one proceeds slowly at first, relishing the texture of Spenser’s language and reading the poetry aloud, it soon becomes less foreign. This statement comes from the editor’s years of observing even the most skeptical and daunted students become adept at reading Spenser.

b.

Making Use of Footnotes and Other Editorial Materials

“The Life of Edmund Spenser” and “The Letter to Raleigh,” given as appendices to this volume, may serve as further introductions to the poem, or it may work best to read them after having progressed through a canto or two. The Index of Characters, which indicates where a particular character appears in the poem, will be especially useful to the reader who is looking back over previously read cantos in the process of writing an interpretation. The Textual Notes show important variants in early printings of the epic (given that we do not have a manuscript in Spenser’s handwriting), and the Works Cited will give some idea of where to begin in reading Spenserian literary criticism. Those who are new to Spenser will want to read as many of the footnotes as possible for the first few cantos, given that many apparently modern words have unexpected Elizabethan meanings. The Elizabethan word “merely,” for example, means “completely,” and the word “approve” means “test.” When possible, this edition gives notes that make etymologies useful; for example, in addition to defining “poynant speare” as “piercing spear,” the note indicates that the adjective “poynant” is actually a spelling of the modern word “poignant.” The reader may then decide whether, in context, the poem is asking us to associate the spear’s sharpness with a psychological pang of some sort.

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Once a particular word has been defined in the notes several times, it no longer rates a note, but the reader may consult the Glossary at the end of the volume. The editor has attempted to provide footnotes that will enable, rather than substitute for, the reader’s own pleasures of interpretation. All commentary is to some degree interpretive, but the notes in this volume are designed chiefly to explain historical and social contexts that can aid the reader’s understanding, in addition to mentioning literary influences upon Spenser’s work. Now and then, bits of interpretation are intentionally included by way of leavening, to give the reader who is unfamiliar with Spenser some idea of approaches that may be taken, but the editor has intentionally avoided giving an overview of the current state of Spenserian scholarship. At the end of this Introduction, there is a sample list of some issues addressed by current Spenserian studies, but this list excludes the arguments that scholars have made with reference to those issues. The notes for Book Four give slightly more interpretive material than do those for Book Three, under the assumption that by then, the reader will have less need for notes defining words or explaining grammar. Nonetheless, these brief mentions of critical arguments are designed not to cover the territory, but to spark the reader’s interest in developing his or her own argumentative responses to the text. After having read through this edition, the reader may well wish for more extensive commentary in some areas. An excellent edition for Spenserian scholars is the Longman text edited by A. C. Hamilton, whose notes, along with those in Thomas Roche’s edition and the Variorum, were immensely useful in the preparation of the present volume. Another superb resource is the Wordhoard software by Martin Mueller et al., which is distributed for free from http://wordhoard.northwestern.edu and which allows for powerful searches within The Faerie Queene. The user may search, say, for all words that are used by Spenser but not by Shakespeare, or for all of the nouns that Spenser modifies with the adjective “civil.” The reader interested in further forays into Spenserian literary criticism may consult the Works Cited, with the caveat that it represents only works cited in this volume, rather than an overview of the state of the field. One can find a great deal of additional useful material by searching the MLA Bibliography Online and Early English Books Online, available through most university library Web sites.

c.

Relaxing as You Read

The extraordinary complexity of The Faerie Queene does not mean that your reading experience must be full of anxiety. Rest assured that even

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scholars who write books about this poem find it difficult to put all of the sections of each character’s story into one coherent whole or to keep track of the relationships among cantos, and trying to figure out every tiny piece of the poem on a first reading could drive one mad. Dig into the poem’s ambiguities and complexities only when they reach out to grab you and refuse to let go; this will happen often enough. Do not try to make the entire poem say or represent one set of questions, much less one set of teachings. Canto by canto, the same character may serve varied allegorical purposes, depending upon the context. If a previously heroic character appears in the role of a buffoon, trust your instinct about the tone of each passage and, instead of deciding that the serious passage must “really” be comic or the comic passage must “really” be serious, figure out what each is doing on its own. When a character enters the poem anonymously, do not skip ahead in the text or notes to learn the character’s name; instead, understand that the poem is asking us to examine the character before we have a convenient label for him or her. At times, the initial lack of a name helps us participate in the confusion or doubt experienced by other characters who are meeting the new character for the first time. Paul Alpers emphasizes the importance of the poem’s happening in the time it takes us to read, rather than in the fictional time during which characters complete certain actions: “An episode in The Faerie Queene, then, is best described as a developing psychological experience within the reader, rather than as an action to be observed by [that reader]” (14). When Spenser’s narrator encourages us to take one point of view and then causes us to revise our earlier perception, the sum total of this experience is neither that the second experience cancels out the first nor that the two are equally balanced. Rather, it is important that we have experienced the change from one perception to another while still having a memory of the first. Similarly, whenever you figure out the grammar and diction of a particular passage and yet remain confused, trust that the poem is inducing confusion for some reason. Several times, for example, the narrator describes a heroic character and his or her foe in a stanza in which the pronouns for the two characters become vertiginously entangled. Ask yourself what the poem is saying to us by making us wonder, even temporarily, which character is which. At the same time, realize that by calling attention to its own confusions and ambiguities, the poem is asking us to attempt, however imperfectly, to disentangle the strands. Part of the meaning of the poem is precisely this urge it induces in the reader: the flurried leafing back to earlier cantos in an attempt to find continuity, the teasing sense that an orderly pattern floats in our peripheral vision but disappears when we look directly at it.

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In this sense, Spenser’s epic is true to our everyday lives, in which we are unlikely to find one solution or theory that will cover all contingencies.

d.

The Romance Epic Genre

Romance is a genre primarily of the Middle Ages, rather than of the nineteenth-century Romantic period, and the romance of the genre comes not only from erotic love plots but also from the exotic adventures of knights on horseback. Adventure of some sort is the one element that all romances have in common. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a romance par excellence––though few English examples of the genre before Spenser are as sophisticated and witty as Sir Gawain, which explores how difficult it is for a knight to reconcile the competing codes of chivalry, courtly love, and Christianity. It is important to understand that in the West, chivalry was largely a literary phenomenon, developed from the Medieval European crusaders’ observations of Arab military etiquette. Even while massacring entire Arab towns or being taken prisoner themselves, the Europeans admired the Arab commanders’ equestrian skills, courtly manners, artistic sensitivity, and policy of showing mercy toward their conquered opponents. (For more about Europeans’ views of the Middle East, see IV.viii.44.3.n.) From the first, then, the romance genre was associated with locales and customs considered both foreign and alluring: French authors wrote about Arthurian Britain and ancient Rome, as well as about the Middle East. This geographical exoticism was paired with supernatural elements that were equally far from the authors’ everyday lives. The heroes of romances were often aided in their quests by magic spells that helped them defeat superhuman monsters. Eventually, English authors began to use Arthurian legends of Britain, but like the French authors, they transformed the fairly crude early Medieval society in which an historical Arthur would have existed into a sophisticated, sparkling, and intellectually subtle series of fictions. Among other things, the emphasis upon courtly love, according to which knights swore to serve and honor highborn ladies, provided a counterpoint to the overt misogyny of the Medieval church theologians. In the Renaissance, Italians such as Ariosto and Tasso combined the romance genre with the more ancient epic genre, and Spenser followed suit. Greek and Roman epics such as the Odyssey, Illiad, and Aeneid are long poetic narratives characterized by national or regional history (however mythologized), interest in the origins of a people, heroic deeds of characters who are human but larger than life, and highly technical descriptions of important battles. Through their imitations of ancient epic writers and of each other, Renaissance writers from various countries

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developed an interest in the ways that the history of one people might resemble that of another, and Renaissance romance epics often construct parallel histories. In The Faerie Queene, a fictional history of Faerie Land runs along beside a quasi-historical history of Britain, with the former providing commentary upon—and alternatives to—the latter. An important difference between epic and romance is that whereas epic narrative—at least that of Western European epic—has a goal and a direction, the romance quest may deliberately wander, opening up new perspectives with every turn. Spenser plays the two narrative modes off each other, so the reader should not assume, without deliberation, that any given canto or book formulates an orderly, philosophical progression. Whereas some critics have seen Britomart as moving through her story from sexual naïveté to a more complex understanding of chastity, for example, John Watkins argues that her development from intellectual naïveté to sophistication is not accompanied by a similar development in her embodiment of the virtue of chastity (173). Romance and epic are uneasy companions, but that very uneasiness is conducive to a probing conversation.

e.

Allegory and Word Play

An allegory is essentially an extended allusion, a work of fiction in which the narrative events point toward another series of events or system of ideas. Thus, an account of knights in Faerie Land fighting one another may refer simultaneously to England’s defeat of the Spanish Armada in Spenser’s own lifetime—or to conceptual conflicts between Protestant and Catholic views of grace—or to struggles within the human psyche. Because Spenser’s allegory usually signifies on several levels at once, it is tempting to decide that almost any allegorical key will work, but such is not the case. Always consider the surface first; if the tone and details of a particular passage ask the reader to sympathize with Squire Timias despite his failings, it would be wise to think twice before deciding that on another level, he is an allegorical symbol for the Antichrist. An allegorical narrative is not a novel. When the decidedly nasty Duessa uses magic to make herself appear young, beautiful, and modest, other characters are consistently fooled into believing her disguise. In a novel, we might be asked to excuse the characters who are so fooled, given the strength of Duessa’s magic, but in an allegory, being unable to see through a disguise often indicates that one lacks the moral perception to see truly. When Florimell continually runs away from lechers who persist in chasing her, the point is not simply that she is unfortunate, but that her chastity, though pure, differs in some important way from that of Britomart, who successfully fends off lascivious attackers.

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Spenser’s allegory is all the more satisfying because its major characters are never purely good or purely bad—nor, indeed, purely exemplars of holiness, temperance, chastity, friendship, justice, or courtesy. The hero of the Book of Temperance concludes his quest with an episode of violent intemperance, and the heroine of the Book of Chastity spends a great deal of time being uncertain as to what chastity means. The Faerie Queene is, as Jon Quitslund points out, about “individual psyches, female as well as male, and their construction by the institutions of society” (191). This means that the poem defines the six virtues through time— that is, the time in which the poem occurs, rather than the time represented by the plot. Additionally, the poem defines the virtues through the interactions among characters, and these interactions are just as likely to exist in the readers’ minds as in the social contact among characters. In the plot of the poem, Adonis never meets Timias, yet because Adonis loves a woman who controls and satisfies him (III.vi.46–49) while Timias loves a woman who controls and shuns him (III.v.26–50, IV.vii.35–37), we might well hypothesize that the poem is asking us to develop ideas about the relationship between love and control by considering these characters together. Additionally, Spenser sometimes uses several minor characters to represent discrete aspects of one major character, as when Britomart’s complicated chastity is diffracted among the simpler but diverse chastities of Amoret, Belphoebe, Florimell, and Æmylia. Whereas most novels prioritize the psychological development of individual characters, Spenser’s allegory is more likely to generate psychological, political, and moral complexity through combinations of characters. The allegory also asks us to see—or to construct, in the process of reading—exchanges of significance between characters and inanimate objects. Spenser is a master of the transferred epithet, in which an adjective grammatically modifies one noun but logically must describe another. When Malecasta rises in the middle of the night from “her wearie bed” and her servants find her “lying on the sencelesse grownd” (III.i.59, 63), it is clearly she who is weary and then senseless. Nevertheless, as Andrew Zurcher observes, the epithets’ transference from person to thing “distributes will and activity into [inanimate objects] in a way peculiarly suited to allegory, and creates metonymic associations between agents and instruments. . . . Beds come to stand as emblems of weariness external to weary human subjects, and the ground becomes a symbol of senselessness. . . . [T]o fall to the ground in Spenser is to remember that you are dust, by enacting it” (e-mail to the editor). Spenser uses many additional poetic devices to produce multiple layers of meaning. Like most of his contemporaries, he is fond of puns, enabled

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by the erratic spelling of Renaissance English. Because the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) lists words under every known spelling variant and gives dated examples of each sense of the word, it is particularly useful in helping modern readers decide when and how a pun operates. Sometimes a word may act as a pun on itself, when one definition of that word is on its way out and a significantly different definition is on its way in; for example, the sample sentences given in the OED for the word “villainous” demonstrate that in the sixteenth century, the word was changing from a synonym for “low-born and unmannerly” to a synonym for “wicked.” This transition gave authors the opportunity to use the word ambiguously. The Glossary and notes to this edition often point out such instances. Another layering device is the repetition of a word, phrase, or image in several contexts, with a slightly different meaning in each context. Such repetitions ask the reader to evaluate the contexts in light of each other. An important layering device that Spenser takes from Ariosto is interlacement, the weaving of various plots in and out of each other. After following Timias’ story for a couple of cantos, the narrator may mention that Timias has been having too full a life to think of his master, who has all this time been in another part of the forest—and suddenly the narrative switches to the master’s story. The narrative may or may not revert to Timias later, and we may or may not learn what has happened to him in the meantime. The constant juxtaposition of plots, which is far more intense in Books Three and Four than in the previous books, again invites us to allow infusions of meaning from one plot to another.

f.

Meter and Stanzaic Form

By rearranging and extending some existing stanza forms, Spenser invented a new and extraordinarily flexible stanza, which we now call the Spenserian Stanza: eight lines of iambic pentameter (with five stressed syllables) followed by one of iambic hexameter (with six stressed syllables), rhyming ababbcbcc. Italian could handle such a rhyme scheme easily, but the relative dearth of rhyming words in English makes the scheme more challenging. At the same time, because the fifth line ends with the same rhyme as the second and fourth, while the final two lines form an uneven couplet, the rhyme scheme allows the stanza to arrange itself simultaneously into several groupings: abab bcbc c abab bcb cc ababb cbcc aba bb cbc c

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In addition, all of the b-rhymes form a group in our heads, as do all of the c-rhymes. Spenser uses these overlapping groupings to draw our attention to various relationships in the content of the lines. The interlocking rhyme scheme impels the stanza forward, aided by Spenser’s extraordinarily fluid use of iambs––even in long and grammatically complex sentences. Pushing against this onrushing rhythm is the hexameter line—also known as an Alexandrine—at the close of each stanza. The additional length of the Alexandrine, in conjunction with the couplet rhyme (cc), contributes to a sense of closure. Indeed, the final two lines of many stanzas have the sound of two-line proverbs, as though we were being given parting advice. The aural resemblance is, more often than not, illusory, as one stanza tumbles into the next without offering anything so neat as a concluding moral. Patricia Parker writes that the poem “seems to be exploring the implications of [lyric versus epic narrative] in its very form—narrative in its forward, linear quest and yet composed out of lyric stanzas that, like the enchantresses within it, potentially suspend or retard” (66).

4. Summaries of Books One and Two Although the plot of The Faerie Queene is hardly its most important unifying feature, it will help the reader who begins with Book Three to know the general shape of Books One and Two. The Redcrosse Knight—who appears in Books Two and Three, as well—is the hero of Book One, the Legend of Holiness. Accompanied and coached by Una, who represents the True Church, he travels on a quest to free her parents from a dragon. In the course of this quest, he meets various enemies to holiness, including the wicked enchanter Archimago and the witch Duessa, who represent the falseness and deception of the Catholic faith. Although Redcrosse temporarily defeats Duessa, she will continue to assume various disguises in future books. At the end of Book One, after spiritual setbacks that almost result in despair, Redcrosse slays the dragon and marries Una. Her own father “the holy knotts did knitt, / That none but death for ever can divide” (I.xii.37), but if their marital union cannot be divided, their bodies can: after the wedding, Redcrosse fulfills his promise to return to the Faerie court to serve the Faerie Queen for six years. Una remains with her parents, mourning his absence. Her position is thus a preparation for that of Britomart, who in Book Three agonizes over the physical absence of a beloved whom she has met only in a vision. Sir Guyon is the hero of Book Two, the Legend of Temperance, though he will also play an important role in Book Three. The Aristotelian

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virtue of temperance applies to all areas of life: the temperate person shuns excess or self-indulgence in any direction. (Two important interpretive questions are why Spenser puts this virtue before that of chastity and how he uses the characters to comment upon the relationship between these two virtues.) Accompanied by the Palmer, a pilgrim who gives him moral and spiritual guidance, Guyon travels on a quest to defeat the witch Acrasia, whose Bower of Bliss is a paradise of sensual pleasures. On the way, Guyon meets various intemperate characters, of whom some must be defeated or avoided, while others serve primarily as object lessons. The reader who begins with Book Three will need to know that in Book Two, Guyon coolly resists temptations and rides a famously calm horse. (His role in Book Three is less magisterial.) Twothirds of the way through Book Two, Guyon finds a book titled Antiquitee of Faery Lond, reproduced in the succeeding canto as a chronicle of Briton kings from Brute to Gloriana (II.ix–x); this history will be considerably augmented in Book Three (III.iii.26–50 and ix.33–51). In the final canto of Book Two, Spenser uses Odyssean references to describe Guyon and the Palmer’s journey to the wandering islands on which the seductive witch Acrasia lives in her Bower of Bliss. After the narrator has described the gorgeous birds, plants, and art of the Bower, Guyon intemperately smashes all of it.

5. Preparation for Book Three a.

Amazons

Although Britomart is not, strictly speaking, an Amazon, Spenser’s conception of her is indebted to previous authors’ accounts of the Amazons. These were a semi-legendary race of female warriors who consorted with men only in order to give birth to female babies. Male offspring were murdered, maimed, or banished soon after birth. Each woman cut off one of her breasts, so as to be able to draw a bowstring unimpeded, and Amazonian troops were famously brave in battle against the male armies of other societies. Like the ancient Greeks and Romans, Europeans used stories about Amazons both to praise their strength and to vilify their flouting of supposedly natural laws about women’s subjection to men. Louis Montrose explains that the double face of the Amazonian image usually kept Elizabethans from using it to praise their queen, though Raleigh employed both faces of the image shrewdly in order to put political pressure on Elizabeth to demonstrate that she was not out to impair or banish the system of masculine rule (Montrose, 78).

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Queen Elizabeth and Her Poet

In addition to making Britomart a female warrior, Spenser makes her the ancestor of Elizabeth, and the poem’s technique of paralleling ancient and contemporary history allows Britomart simultaneously to mirror Elizabeth herself—with crucial differences. Like Elizabeth, Britomart is an emblem of chastity, but her chastity is only temporarily virginal, given that she is destined to marry. Elizabeth and her promoters used the idea of the Virgin Queen to link her with the cult of the Virgin Mary, a medium of prayer, grace, and comfort that was denied to Protestant worshippers in England after Elizabeth’s father, Henry VIII, severed ties with the Catholic Church in Rome. Although the Virgin Queen was not divine, she was now represented as the earthly medium of all grace and comfort. Her mystically impenetrable body was held to insure that her island realm would remain similarly impenetrable (Stallybrass, 130). Yet whereas Catholicism considered virginity the highest state of chastity (that is, of sexually pure thinking and living) and praised the monastic life, Protestantism privileged marriage, considering the relationship of husband and wife a divinely sanctioned microcosm of that between monarch and subjects––which, in turn, was a divinely sanctioned microcosm of that between God and humanity. In other words, Protestantism emphasized the chastity of physical, emotional, and spiritual faithfulness within a marriage. Each reader of Britomart’s story must wrestle with the question of how the poem is asking us to view the Virgin Queen. The proems— groups of four to eleven stanzas that precede the first canto of each book—address Queen Elizabeth directly, in her capacity as the poem’s primary inspiration, supporter, reader, pupil, and subject matter. For all of her encouragement of such adulation, Elizabeth was far from feminist. Whereas she exploited her femininity by encouraging the powerful men around her to treat her––at least superficially––as though she were a desirable yet chaste, bountiful yet severe Petrarchan mistress (a role discussed in more detail below), she was astute enough to know that her political power lay in being an exception to the rule of women’s submission. Her aim was not to change women’s roles or opportunities— which actually may have deteriorated during her reign—but to demonstrate that she did not threaten her country’s patriarchal tradition. To that end, she declared that although her physical body was that of a feeble woman, her mystical body was that of kingship. The latter body stretched beyond her personal self to include all of her subjects, and its time on earth stretched before and after her personal life to include all English monarchs.

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Critics debate the extent to which Spenser actually believed the glowing mythology that was built around Elizabeth. In general, we postmodern readers tend to be cynical, assuming that no one could actually have failed to see through Elizabeth’s rhetoric, but in making this assumption, we ignore the powerful and meaningful mythologies to which we ourselves subscribe. Despite their fictions, myths are not falsehoods; they articulate our deepest beliefs, desires, and needs. The reader of The Faerie Queene will do well, then, to treat the question of Spenser’s perceptions of Elizabeth as a genuine issue, rather than as one with a foregone conclusion. At the least, Spenser seems to have been attracted by Elizabeth’s power and, on the other hand, to have felt competitive with respect to that power. Like other men of his time who were born into working-class families but rose to governmental positions by means of a humanist education, he was spurred by the humanist dictum that individual people had individual talents not restricted purely by ancestry. His talents were exercised by his two vocations: that of a secretary to the great, and that of a poet. The two were not nearly so distinct as they might be today: among many other things, his poetry was self-promotion. As Richard Rambuss argues, Elizabethans regarded secretaries not only as personal assistants to noblemen and women, but as the keepers of secrets. Spenser’s choice to write in the mode of allegory, which veils and withholds information from all except the few who are worthy interpreters, demonstrated that he was worthy of high secretarial positions at the same time that it demonstrated the distance between himself and the aristocracy (Rambuss 1993, 4).

c.

Petrarchism and Neoplatonism

The relationship between the narrator of The Faerie Queene and his “dearest dread,” as he calls his sovereign (I.Pr.4), draws upon the standard relationship of the Petrarchan speaker to his lady. Even though previous Petrarchan poets had mostly been aristocrats writing in their spare time, rather than career poets like Spenser, he and they resembled one another in their use of poetry to worship an abstract femininity even as they appropriated it, mingling praise with self-promotion. From its inception with Petrarch in the fourteenth century, the Petrarchan sonnet sequence was a highly self-conscious genre, whose male speaker described his wooing of an inaccessible lady in terms that seriously analyzed his every mood swing, while at the same time ironizing his self-absorption. Petrarchism was infused with Neoplatonism, a Medieval and Renaissance set of philosophies that rewrote Plato according to Christian and

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heterosexual ideals. Neoplatonically speaking, a woman’s beauty was allied with moral purity and could lead the male wooer’s soul to a higher philosophical plane, on which his soul would come to understand its ideal form and its source in God (Quitslund, 238). The fact that Petrarchan sonnets call the beautiful lady a “mistress” can be misleading; the term does not imply a physical union, and indeed, the mistress’s social position, married state, or personal reluctance keeps her emotionally aloof from her suitor. Given that he desires her physically as well as spiritually, and yet admires her chastity, he veers incessantly from adoration to anger to guilt. Her absence and his longing cause great pain, but they also give him the gift of poetry. She controls him, but is created by his words. When Britomart makes a formal complaint to the sea (III.iv.7–11), she joins the few other female poets in Spenser’s era who struggled with what it meant to take on the Petrarchan speaker’s role. The fiction of Queen Elizabeth’s Petrarchan relationship with her courtiers was that she was in the role of the mistress, but for a woman to assume the speaker’s position was more complicated. The few female poets needed to assert their own chastity and modesty at the same time that they fashioned speakers who articulated desire and even pursued the objects of that desire. Despite the Elizabethans’ fondness for strong, talkative women onstage, living women who published could be accused of being public women—whores—in that they shared their inner secrets with male readers whom they did not even know. In other ways, as well, phrases attributed to a female Petrarchan speaker meant something different than did those same phrases attributed to a male speaker: so, for example, a female speaker who berated and humbled herself in the face of her beloved’s perfections was simply doing what a woman was supposed to do, rather than emphasizing the power of her love or the artistic complexity of her emotional states. This last point is especially important, given that love in Book Three entails great pain. Britomart declares memorably that love cannot be compelled by mastery (III.i.25), and readers have tended to take this declaration as a lesson directly from the author; however, as Jonathan Sircy observes, love in Book Three does nothing except compel by mastery (6). Whether the master is the beloved, Cupid, or a cruel enchanter, the only difference between the episodes in which the poem asks us to wish for the lover’s freedom and those in which the poem asks us to celebrate the lover’s bondage is that in the former sort of episode, the lover interprets his or her subjection as torture, whereas in the latter, the lover interprets that subjection as masochistic pleasure and succumbs to it willingly (Sircy, 6–9). Britomart’s self-fashioning is inextricable from a certain loss of self, and we must decide where Spenser’s emphases lie. We must also decide where he finds himself in this narrative.

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xxv

Female Physiology: Constancy and Inconstancy

According to sixteenth-century physiological theory, which was influenced by Pythagoras, Aristotle, and Galen, women’s bodies were in flux and their minds were, as a result, unstable. Even though some philosophers opined that women were as perfect in their own way as men were, and some humanists believed that women could respond brilliantly to education, the prevailing notion was that even the most intellectually gifted woman was held back by her natural tendency toward instability. This was a serious matter, given that sexual constancy was the highest earthly virtue to which a woman should aspire. Precisely because women were inherently prone to err, they were held responsible for keeping themselves firmly in check—and for submitting to men’s rule over them. Critics have debated the extent to which the male Petrarchan speaker, with his violently unstable emotions, is constructed as partly feminine. The reader will want to keep such questions in mind while considering Book Three. It may also be useful to know that in Book Two, just before Guyon finds the chronicle of Briton kings in the turret-brain of an anthropomorphized castle belonging to a female character named Alma, he and Arthur find another turret chamber inhabited by a male figure named Phantastes. This chamber is filled with “Infinite shapes . . . / Such as in idle fantasies doe flit: / Infernall Hags, Centaurs, feendes, Hippodames, / Apes, Lyons, Aegles, Owles, fooles, lovers, children, Dames” (II.ix.50). Fools, lovers, and women keep company with mythological creatures— which are themselves the material of poetry written by men. Britomart is beset with fancies (i.e., fantasies and fanciful desires), and when we interpret how the poem is using her character, it is useful to keep in mind that the poem sets up analogies between the predicted fruitfulness of her love and the productiveness—or lack thereof—of the poet’s craft. If Britomart’s chaste womb is destined to be the repository of Elizabeth’s ancestor, her body and mind are nonetheless unstable in other ways, and her responses to unfamiliar situations often remind us that she is, after all, very young and very much in process.

e.

Homoeroticism in the Renaissance

Because homoeroticism is integral to a number of passages in Books Three and Four (that is, because these passages invite the reader to take pleasure in imagining a sexual charge between two characters of the same sex, whether or not the narrative actually depicts a sexual act), it is important to understand how homoeroticism was defined and regarded in sixteenth-century England. As scholars such as Alan Bray have shown,

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the horror with which many Elizabethans regarded homosexual acts and the fact that such acts were technically punishable by death did not mean that Elizabethan culture had a well-developed concept of homosexuality as a defining characteristic: “In principle it was a crime which anyone was capable of, like murder or blasphemy” (Bray, 40). People who engaged in homosexual acts were assumed, like everyone else, also to want to marry and have children. Indeed, the laws against sodomy were almost never enforced, and men were seldom accused of sodomy, except when two men of unequal social status caused fears that the inferior was gaining political control over the superior (Bray, passim). Women’s same-sex relationships, in contrast, were seldom mentioned by ministers or in legal contexts, given that such relationships were less unlikely to cause imbalances of social power (Traub, 63–5). So long as women married and had children, their desire for other women was nonthreatening (Traub, 79). In literary contexts, however, both male and female homoerotic moments were freely represented. Just as we of the twenty-first century do not assume that the writer of a murder mystery is likely to be a murderer, sixteenth-century audiences did not assume that authors of homoerotic scenes or passages were thereby labeling themselves as members of a distinct class. Similarly, authors assumed—correctly, if their popularity during their lifetimes is any guide—that audience members of almost all sorts would be titillated by homoerotic scenes and passages. The exceptions were people who distrusted all amorous delights, but “To such,” declares Spenser’s narrator, “I do not sing at all” (IV.Pr.4).

f.

Ireland

Books Three and Four are less obviously concerned about Anglo-Irish politics than is Book Five, but Spenser’s experiences in Ireland (for which, see “The Life of Edmund Spenser” in this volume) permeate the entire poem. As secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, Elizabeth’s Lord Deputy in colonial Ireland, Spenser purchased an estate in that country and continued to live there, holding various minor governmental posts, long after Elizabeth had relieved Lord Grey of his position. Spenser wrote most of The Faerie Queene in Ireland, loving its landscape and admiring its poetry while nonetheless advocating brutal suppression of its people. According to Andrew Hadfield, Spenser was in the paradoxical position of believing that colonial expansion was necessary in order to maintain national identity, yet worrying that the English were diluting their identity by mixing their culture and bloodlines with those of the Irish (Hadfield 2004, 126). As Elizabeth grew too old to bear children and her cousin, James VI of Scotland, was discussed as a possible heir, it

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was clear that a merger of England and Scotland could pose a larger version of the same conundrum (ibid.). This political paradox is reflected in Spenser’s poetry. Richard McCabe observes that Spenser’s epic fuses two modes of allegory: the moral and the colonial. Whereas moral allegory is comfortable with locating the potential for evil in characters who represent “us,” colonial allegory projects the otherness of evil outward, uncomfortable with the idea that there is any overlap between self and other (18). Yet, as David Baker puts it, “Whatever Spenser was at the end of his life, he was no longer (if he ever had been) purely ‘English’” (78). To what extent Spenser himself realized this is open for debate. In The Faerie Queene, the great knights’ internal failings are continually revolved outward, onto “other” characters and onto the landscape, remaking the foreign every time a hero or heroine subdues a monster.

g.

Endings

The truest observation one can make about Spenser’s endings is that to the degree that they exist in the first place, they evaporate soon afterward. Marriages are followed by separation; imprisoned monsters escape; happy reunions are described in uncomfortable ways; and the narrator regularly abandons plots that he has promised to continue. Jonathan Goldberg urges Spenserian scholars to recognize that “failed endings are a part of the design of the poem” and to address the pleasures of this narrative frustration (1–2). We may also decide that some of the supposedly happy endings are actually better avoided, especially if one is thinking from the position of the female characters (Stephens, 27). But current Spenserian scholars largely agree that it is both more interesting and more honest to accept the endings in their inconstancy and incompletion than it is to imagine an ideal text in which they would all be “corrected.” This editor does not want to spoil the reader’s pleasure by describing in advance the two endings of Book Three, but it is to be hoped that the reader is now forewarned to be on the alert.

6. Preparation for Book Four This edition puts Books Three and Four into one volume because Book Four is nearly impossible to understand without having first read its predecessor. (By the same token, this section on Book Four presumes that the reader will also have perused the much longer section above on Book Three.) Spenser published Books One, Two, and Three together in 1590, followed six years later by a second volume that included all six

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books. There was thus a considerable gap between the original readers’ first encounter with Book Three and their encounter with Book Four. Nonetheless, most of the main characters of Book Four come straight from the previous book, and the two books share major plot lines. The title page for Book Four announces “The Legend of Cambel and Telamond, or of Friendship,” but the fact that neither of these characters has appeared in the previous book is immaterial, since they turn out chiefly to be excuses for further commentary on Britomart, Amoret, Scudamour, Arthur, Artegall, and other familiar characters. The newly introduced Telamond cannot even keep his own name straight; he appears later as Triamond. This sharing of major characters between the two books does not mean that Book Four is simply a continuation of Book Three. Most obviously, many of the events of Book Four occur before those of Book Three in fictional time; that is, Book Four describes what events led up to those that conclude Book Three. But more importantly, as Alpers points out, it is a mistake to believe that the fictionally prior events described in Book Four somehow explain those of the previous book (109). Whereas Book Four depends upon Book Three, the reverse is not precisely the case. Despite the fictional chronology, the rhetorical sequence places Book Four after Book Three, and we need to take seriously our reading of Book Three on its own before we retroactively analyze it from the position of Book Four. McCabe argues that the final three books of The Faerie Queene enact a process of self-examination as they quote and revise the first three books (209). Hadfield sees Book Four as developing themes of Book Three more deeply, “opening out and qualifying the discussions of love and chastity into the more social and public arenas of friendship and wider bonds of familial union” (2001, 128). Craig Berry writes, “[I]t seems that Spenser, having borrowed avidly and often from the reputedly frivolous Ariosto in the first three books, now turns to the serious resonances of Chaucer’s reputation to correct his image. . . .” (121); evoking these serious resonances even while choosing one of Chaucer’s least didactic and most romantic tales to revise is, for Spenser, “a way to embrace the contradictions of his own career” (122). Whether we subscribe to one of these three theories or to some other interpretation, we need to recognize that the Books of Chastity and of Friendship have different aims. Friendship was the subject of treatises in ancient Rome as well as in Renaissance England, because it was seen not as merely a private virtue, but as the basis for the larger patterns of cooperation that form a civil society. Graham Hough notes that, despite the lack of one central plot, “gradually it becomes apparent that we are observing a series of exempla

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of true and false friendship” (183). In Hough’s formulation, Books Three and Four belong together because the highest form of the “cosmic principle” of friendship is love, which Book Four delineates in its wider social context, after the more private context of Book Three (182–3). Yet erotic love repeatedly fails in the Book of Friendship, and even when it perseveres, it is often ugly and uncomfortable. Andrew Hadfield goes so far as to argue that Book Four implies “that women may be better off without the pains of male attention. . . . What seemed to have been endorsed at the end of the first edition of The Faerie Queene, heterosexual union, actually appears either to threaten stability or fail to satisfy human needs in the second” (2001, 125). Whether this revision of its earlier endorsement makes Book Four merely pessimistic or intriguingly exploratory is a matter of interpretation, but on a stanza-by-stanza basis, the book certainly has its share of beauty, pathos, insight, and astonishment.

7. Sources and Influences Spenser was strongly influenced by the epic and pastorals of the ancient Roman writer Virgil, and by Ovid’s interlocking stories of gods and humans who change into other forms. Additional Greek and Roman mythology came from Hesiod and from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey. Arthurian legend came primarily from Malory, while the emblems of Natalis Comes provided Spenser with a banquet of allegorical symbols. Spenser revered Chaucer as a model of vernacular English verse. More recent models for political and philosophical poetry combined with adventure were the Italian epics written by Dante, Petrarch, Ariosto, and Tasso. Spenser’s contemporaries Raleigh and Harvey, who wrote lyric poetry, and Sidney, who wrote both lyric poetry and a prose romance, gave to Spenser’s verse as much as they learned from it. Spenser drew his history and historical legend chiefly from Geoffrey of Monmouth, Holinshed, Hardyng, and Stow. His love-hate relationship with Neoplatonism was informed by Ficino, Bruno, Bembo, Pico della Mirandola, Ebreo, and, of course, Plato. For cosmology and natural philosophy, he drew from Boethius, Cicero, Lucretius, Plutarch, and Apuleius. His theories of what constituted a “gentleman” were considerably influenced by Castiglione.

8. Issues Addressed by Recent Spenserian Literary Criticism The following list of sample issues pertains chiefly to The Faerie Queene, and especially to Books Three and Four. The hope is that they may kindle interest and help generate new questions.

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When, if ever, does the poem allow “other” voices to speak through the text—e.g., voices from foreign or politically suspect points of view? b. How does an awareness of race speak through this text? When, for example, does the narrator construct Muslims and the Irish as religious others, and when as racial others? c. To what extent do any of the characters participate in animal being, and how does the poem distinguish animal being from that of humans? d. What can we say about the poem’s images of miscegenation between species? Think of species such as humans, fairies, animals, and gods. e. How does the body write itself into this text? What does it mean, for example, when blood from a monstrous body turns into a gushing river or when love’s pains are written into festering wounds? f. According to Spenser, what is the status of suffering in relationship to friendship? g. When disease speaks through this text, what is it saying? h. How can the differences between Ovidian and Spenserian metamorphosis help us understand what Spenser is saying when his characters change their physical forms? i. To what extent is the poem’s narrator masculine or feminine, according to the poem’s definitions of these terms? (It is extraordinarily difficult to answer this sort of question without imposing modern notions of gender or stereotypes of how people in the Renaissance would have defined gender.) j. How do Books Three and Four use same-sex friendships to comment upon the virtues of Chastity and Friendship? k. Are there aspects of the work that at first do not seem tied to gender, but on second glance are (e.g., modes of speech, methods of travel, or types of hospitality)? l. What are the different sorts of power in this poem? Is there any way in which apparently powerless characters actually exert some sort of influence, either upon other characters or upon us as we read? m. What does Book Three suggest about leadership and continence? n. What is Spenser’s conception of the interactions among history (that is, human accounts of events), memory, and desire?

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o.

xxxi

In what ways do The Faerie Queene and Spenser’s View of the Present State of Ireland complement or contradict each other as analyses of England’s colonial prospects in Ireland? p. According to Spenser, are justice and nature antithetical, cooperative, identical, unable to communicate with each other, both dependent on some third thing, or what? q. How does this poem define types of fraud, and what are their sources? r. What is the relationship between civility and pity in Book Four? s. In what literary communities does this poem participate, and how? t. In what ways do Spenser’s minor poems (e.g., the Epithalamion, the Amoretti, and The Shepheardes Calender) complement or reinterpret particular passages of The Faerie Queene? u. What patterns of metaphor does Spenser use, and where? What mileage does he get out of these patterns? v. To which details does the poem ask us to pay attention, and which does it encourage us to overlook? w. What relationship does this poem construct between the reader and the narrator? What sort of reader does this poem assume or induce?

Title page to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23081).

TO THE MOST MIGHTIE AND MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE ELIZABETH, BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND, FRANCE AND IRELAND DEFENDER OF THE FAITH &c.

Her most humble Seruant: Ed. Spenser

The thirde Booke of the Faerie Queene. Contayning

The Legend of Britomartis. OR

Of Chastity. 1

It falls me1 here to write of Chastity, The fayrest vertue, far above the rest; For which what needes me2 fetch from Faery Forreine ensamples,3 it to have exprest? Sith it is shrined in my Soveraines brest,4 And formd so lively in each perfect part, That to all Ladies, which have it profest, Neede but behold the pourtraict5 of her hart, If pourtrayd it might bee by any living art.

2

But living art may not least part expresse, Nor life-resembling pencill it can paynt, All were it Zeuxis or Praxiteles:6 His dædale7 hand would faile, and greatly faynt, And her perfections with his error taynt: Ne8 Poets witt, that passeth Painter farre In picturing the parts of beauty daynt,9 So hard a workemanship adventure darre, For fear through want10 of words her excellence to marre.

1

symbol both of consummate artistry and of overly confident ambition. 8 Ne: nor. No one really knows how this word—which Spenser uses frequently— would have been pronounced. The OED gives a long e; Monty Python gives a short i (in “The Knights Who Say ‘Ni’”); some scholars read the word aloud with a long a; and others use the schwa (an unstressed vowel sound, as in the a of “about,” the e of “item,” or the i of “edible”). 9 daynt: dainty; delightful; precious; choice. 10 want: lack.

falls me: falls to me; is up to me. what needes me: why would I need. 3 ensamples: examples. 4 Sith: since; in my Soveraines brest: see Introduction, 5b. 5 pourtraict: portrait. 6 Zeuxis or Praxiteles: artists famed in ancient Greece for their skill in depicting women. 7 dædale: referring to Daedalus, who made wings for himself and his son, Icarus, out of wax and feathers. Icarus flew too near the sun, which melted the wax and caused him to fall to his death. Daedalus is thus a 2

3

4

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

3

How then shall I, Apprentice of the skill, That whilome1 in divinest wits did rayne, Presume so high to stretch mine humble quill?2 Yet now my luckelesse lott doth me constrayne Hereto perforce. But O dredd3 Soverayne Thus far forth pardon, sith that choicest witt Cannot your glorious pourtraict figure playne, That I in colourd showes may shadow itt,4 And antique5 praises unto present persons fitt.

4

But if in living colours, and right hew,6 Thy selfe thou covet to see pictured,7 Who can it doe more lively, or more trew, Then that sweete verse, with Nectar sprinckeled, In which a gracious servaunt pictured His Cynthia, his heavens fayrest light?8 That with his melting sweetnes ravished, And with the wonder of her beames bright, My sences lulled are in slomber of delight.

5

But let that same delitious Poet lend A little leave unto a rusticke Muse To sing his mistresse prayse, and let him mend, If ought amis her liking may abuse:9

1

whilome: formerly. The fact that it was standard practice for an author to claim his own inadequacy does not mean we should take Spenser’s self-deprecation lightly. He had no assurance that the Queen would approve of his poem, which allegorized her failings as well as her virtues, and he knew he was undertaking a project that could seem presumptuous: to write England’s first national epic. 3 I.e., yet my duty is to do precisely this (to dare to write about Elizabeth); dredd: dreaded. Monarchs were praised for inspiring a combination of fear, admiration, and love in their subjects. 4 I.e., that I may hint at your glory through the beauties of allegory. See “The Letter to Raleigh” (p. 451) for Spenser’s discussion of his conception of allegory. 2

5

antique: pun on “antic,” meaning “absurdly fantastic.” Spenser’s admiration for the medieval Chaucer prompted him to adopt some of Chaucer’s antiquated English vocabulary and phrasing, which caused some ribbing from fellow authors. 6 hew: form; condition. 7 pictured: three syllables. Reading Spenser aloud with attention to the meter will give a feel for the times when he expects normally silent endings to be pronounced. 8 Spenser’s friend Sir Walter Raleigh had composed “Cynthia, the Lady of the Sea,” an elegy to Elizabeth. 9 I.e., let him correct my poem if she dislikes any of it.

Proem

5

Ne let his fayrest Cynthia refuse, In mirrours more then one her selfe to see, But either Gloriana let her chuse, Or in Belphœbe fashioned to bee: In th’one her rule, in th’other her rare chastitee.1

1

Spenser invites Elizabeth to see herself allegorized in two of the characters in his epic: the queen Gloriana (who never actually appears, though she is often mentioned) and Belphoebe (modeled on the Greek Diana, virgin goddess of the hunt and the

moon). “Belle” means “beautiful” in Italian; “phoebe” means “pure” or “radiant” in Greek and is a name for Diana in her role as moon goddess. Belphoebe will enter in Canto Five.

Canto One Guyon encountreth Britomart, Faire Florimell is chaced:1 Duessaes traines2 and Malecastaes champions are defaced.3

1

The famous Briton Prince and Faery knight,4 After long wayes and perilous paines endur’d, Having their weary limbes to perfect plight5 Restord, and sory wounds right well recur’d,6 Of the faire Alma greatly were procur’d,7 To make there lenger sojourne and abode; But when thereto they might not be allur’d, From seeking praise, and deeds of armes abrode,8 They courteous conge tooke, and forth together yode.9

2

But the captiv’d Acrasia he10 sent, Because of traveill long, a nigher11 way, With a strong gard, all reskew to prevent, And her to Faery court safe to convay, That her for witnes of his hard assay,12 Unto his Faery Queene he might present: But he him selfe betooke another way, To make more triall of his hardiment,13 And seeke adventures, as he with Prince Arthure went.

1

8

chaced: pun on “chaste” and “chased.” traines: entrapments. 3 The italicized four lines of alternating tetrameter and trimeter at the first of each canto are called an Argument; they briefly summarize the canto’s plot. 4 I.e., Prince Arthur and Sir Guyon. See Introduction, 4. 5 plight: condition. 6 recur’d: cured. 7 procur’d: urged.

abrode: abroad, far and wide. In the early medieval world about which Spenser writes, a knight was supposed to seek glory, fame, and praise. It is useful to compare attitudes toward ambition in this poem with those in Beowulf, in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, and in Utopia. 9 conge: farewell; yode: went. 10 Acrasia: the seductress (see Introduction, 4); he: Sir Guyon. 11 nigher: nearer. 12 assay: effort. 13 hardiment: courage and hardihood.

2

6

Canto One

3

Long so they traveiled through wastefull1 wayes, Where daungers dwelt, and perils most did wonne,2 To hunt for glory and renowmed prayse; Full many Countreyes they did overronne, From the uprising to the setting Sunne, And many hard adventures did atchieve; Of all the which they honour ever wonne, Seeking the weake oppressed to relieve, And to recover right for such, as wrong did grieve.

4

At last as through an open plaine they yode,3 They spide a knight, that towards pricked4 fayre, And him beside an aged Squire there rode, That seemd to couch5 under his shield three-square, As if that age badd6 him that burden spare, And yield it those,7 that stouter could it wield: He them espying, gan him selfe prepare, And on his arme addresse8 his goodly shield That bore a Lion passant in a golden field.9

5

Which seeing good Sir Guyon, deare besought The Prince of grace, to let him ronne that turne.10 He graunted: then the Faery quickly raught11 His poynant speare, and sharply gan to spurne12 His fomy steed, whose fiery feete did burne The verdant gras, as he thereon did tread; Ne13 did the other backe his foot returne, But fiercely forward came withouten dread, And bent14 his dreadful speare against the others head.

1

wastefull: deserted. wonne: abide. 3 yode: went. 4 pricked: spurred his horse toward them. 5 couch: crouch. 6 badd: bade. 7 yield it those: yield it to those. 8 addresse: prepare. 9 passant in a golden field: a description of a coat of arms depicting a lion walking, 2

7

with its right forepaw raised, against a golden background. 10 I.e., when good Sir Guyon saw this, he fervently asked Prince Arthur, as a favor, to let him take the challenge. Prince Arthur often brings, or mediates, grace of one sort or another in the poem. 11 Faery: Guyon; raught: reached for. 12 poynant: piercing (lit. poignant); to spurne: to spur. 13 Ne: nor. 14 bent: turned, aimed.

8

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

6

They beene ymett, and both theyr points arriv’d, But Guyon drove so furious and fell,1 That seemd both shield and plate it would have riv’d; Nathelesse it bore his foe not from his sell,2 But made him stagger, as3 he were not well: But Guyon selfe, ere well he was aware, Nigh a speares length behind his crouper4 fell, Yet in his fall so well him selfe he bare,5 That mischievous mischaunce his life and limbs did spare.

7

Great shame and sorrow of that fall he tooke; For never yet, sith warlike armes he bore, And shivering6 speare in bloody field first shooke, He fownd him selfe dishonored so sore. Ah gentlest7 knight, that ever armor bore, Let not thee grieve dismounted to have beene, And brought to grownd, that never wast before; For not thy fault, but secret powre unseene, That speare enchaunted was, which layd thee on the greene.8

8

But weenedst thou,9 what wight thee overthrew, Much greater griefe and shamefuller regrett For thy hard fortune then thou wouldst renew, That of a single damzell thou wert mett On equall plaine, and there so hard besett; Even the famous Britomart10 it was, Whom straunge adventure did from Britayne fett,11 To seeke her lover (love far sought alas,) Whose image shee had seene in Venus looking glas.12

1

9

2

10

fell: cruel, dire (cf. “felon”). sell: saddle. 3 as: as if. 4 crouper: crupper. 5 bare: bore. 6 shivering: prone to shattering other spears; quivering with energy. 7 gentlest: most noble. The poem’s speaker addresses Guyon directly. 8 In Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso, the virgin warrior Bradamante uses an enchanted spear that can defeat all knights (23.15).

weenedst thou: if you knew. Britomart: her name allies British pride with martial prowess. Compare her fierce brand of chastity with other sorts of chastity and unchastity in the book. 11 adventure: chance; quest; fett: fetch. 12 We can think of meetings such as the one between Guyon and Britomart as allegorically representing relationships among the political, moral, or other concepts embodied in the two characters. In psychological terms, two characters meet because they need to meet each other, in order to work

Canto One

9

Full of disdainefull wrath, he fierce uprose, For to revenge that fowle reprochefull shame, And snatching his bright sword began to close With her on foot, and stoutly forward came; Dye rather would he, then endure that same. Which when his Palmer1 saw, he gan to feare His2 toward perill and untoward blame, Which by that new rencounter he should reare:3 For death sate on the point of that enchaunted speare.

10

And hasting towards him gan fayre perswade, Not to provoke misfortune, nor to weene4 His speares default5 to mend with cruell blade; For by his mightie Science he had seene The secrete vertue of that weapon keene, That mortall puissaunce mote not withstond: Nothing on earth mote6 alwaies happy beene. Great hazard were it, and adventure fond,7 To loose long gotten honour with one evill hond.

11

By such good meanes he him discounselled, From prosecuting his revenging rage; And eke the Prince like treaty handeled,8 His9 wrathfull will with reason to asswage, And laid the blame, not to his carriage,10 But to his starting steed, that swarv’d asyde,

out something about their self-image or way of living in the world. Here, one could say that Chastity triumphs over mere Temperance, but that the two virtues work best together. Such an interpretation is oversimplified, however, given that Britomart is learning how to be chaste rather than flatly representing a static notion of chastity. We must also consider the tone of this episode, which is humorous not only at Guyon’s expense, but also at Britomart’s: she comes into view spoiling for a fight with someone, anyone; Venus looking glas: see ii.18.8.n. 1 Palmer: a pilgrim, especially one who has been to Jerusalem. Through all of his

9

travels, Guyon is accompanied by the Palmer, who gives him moral guidance. 2 His: Guyon’s. 3 reare: cause. 4 weene: believe. 5 default: fault. 6

mote: might. fond: foolish. 8 I.e., and also the Prince made use of a similar entreaty. 9 His: Guyon’s. 10 his carriage: the way Guyon had carried himself. 7

10

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

And to the ill purveyance of his page, That had his furnitures1 not firmely tyde: So is his angry corage2 fayrely pacifyde. 12

Thus reconcilement was betweene them knitt, Through goodly temperaunce, and affection chaste, And either3 vowd with all their power and witt, To let not others honour be defaste, Of friend or foe, who ever it embaste,4 Ne armes to beare against the others syde: In which accord the Prince was also plaste, And with that golden chaine of concord tyde. So goodly all agreed, they forth yfere5 did ryde.

13

O goodly usage of those antique tymes,6 In which the sword was servant unto right; When not for malice and contentious crymes, But all for prayse, and proofe of manly7 might, The martiall brood accustomed to fight: Then honour was the meed8 of victory, And yet the vanquished had no despight:9 Let later age that noble use envy,10 Vyle rancor to avoid, and cruel surquedry.11

14

Long they thus traveiled12 in friendly wise, Through countreyes waste, and eke well edifyde,13 Seeking adventures hard, to exercise Their puissance, whylome full dernly14 tryde: At length they came into a forrest wyde, Whose hideous horror and sad trembling sownd

1

furnitures: saddlery and armor. corage: heart as the seat of emotion and thought. 3 either: each. 4 embaste: declared base. 5 yfere: companionably. 6 The fact that Spenser so often praises the past raises the question of what he is saying about Elizabeth’s reign in the present. 7 Note the layers of praise and irony for the female, yet manly, Britomart. 2

8

meed: reward. despight: resentment. 10 envy: admire, with overtones of being mortified at being less admirable oneself. 11 surquedry: arrogance. 12 Note the pun on “travail.” 13 I.e., through wastelands and also through built-up areas. 14 whylome: while; dernly: dismally. 9

Canto One

11

Full griesly seemd: therein they long did ryde, Yet tract1 of living creature none they fownd, Save Beares, Lyons, and Buls, which romed them arownd. 15

All suddenly out of the thickest brush, Upon a milkwhite Palfrey all alone, A goodly Lady did foreby2 them rush, Whose face did seeme as cleare as Christall stone, And eke through feare as white as whales bone: Her garments all were wrought of beaten gold, And all her steed with tinsell trappings shone, Which fledd so fast, that nothing mote him hold, And scarse them leasure gave, her passing to behold.

16

Still as she fledd, her eye she backward threw, As fearing evill, that poursewd her fast; And her faire yellow locks behind her flew, Loosely disperst with puff of every blast: All as a blazing starre doth farre outcast His hearie beames, and flaming lockes dispredd,3 At sight whereof the people stand aghast: But the sage wisard telles, as he has redd,4 That it importunes death and dolefull dreryhedd.5

17

So as they gazed after her a whyle, Lo where a griesly Foster6 forth did rush, Breathing out beastly lust her to defyle: His tyreling Jade7 he fiersly forth did push, Through thicke and thin, both over banck and bush In hope her to attaine by hooke or crooke, That from his8 gory sydes the blood did gush: Large were his limbes, and terrible his looke, And in his clownish hand a sharp bore speare9 he shooke.

1

5

2

6

tract: trace, track. foreby: nearby. 3 dispredd: spread widely. 4 redd: discerned, interpreted, predicted. The Lady’s streaming hair makes her look like a comet, and her horrified gaze in the direction of whatever pursues her expands the simile to that of a wizard who interprets the comet as an omen of future disaster.

dreryhedd: dreariness. griesly Foster: grisly forester. 7 tyreling Jade: tired nag. 8 his: the nag’s. 9 clownish: rustic; bore speare: cf. the stories of Adonis and the boar in stanza 38 and in vi.48. The boar spear may either fight lust or act as its tool.

12

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

18

Which outrage when those gentle1 knights did see, Full of great envy and fell gealosy,2 They stayd not to avise,3 who first should bee, But all spurd after fast, as they mote fly, To reskew her from shamefull villany. The Prince and Guyon equally bylive4 Her selfe pursewd, in hope to win thereby Most goodly meede, the fairest Dame alive: But after the foule foster Timias5 did strive.

19

The whiles faire Britomart, whose constant6 mind, Would not so lightly follow beauties chace, Ne reckt of Ladies Love, did stay behynd, And them awayted there a certaine space, To weet7 if they would turne backe to that place: But when she saw them gone, she forward went, As lay her journey, through that perlous Pace,8 With stedfast corage and stout9 hardiment; Ne evil thing she feard, ne evill thing she ment.

20

At last as nigh out of the wood she came, A stately Castle far away she spyde, To which her steps directly she did frame.10 That Castle was most goodly edifyde,11 And plaste for pleasure nigh that forrest syde: But faire before the gate a spatious playne, Mantled with greene, it selfe did spredden wyde, On which she saw six knights, that did darrayne12 Fiers battaill against one, with cruel might and mayne.

1 gentle: with the virtues of

gentlemen and gentlewomen. See Glossary for a fuller explanation. 2 gealosy: with righteous indignation, but the word also hints that they might like to be in the forester’s place. 3

avise: consult about. bylive: forthwith, quickly. 5 Timias: Arthur’s squire, whose name means “honored,” from the Greek τιµη´εις. Although Timias has appeared many times 4

in Books One and Two, defending and aiding his master, this is the first time that he is named. 6 See Introduction, 5d. 7 weet: discover. 8 perlous Pace: perilous path. 9 stout: proud; brave; hardy. 10 frame: direct. 11 edifyde: erected. 12 darrayne: wage.

Canto One

21

Mainely1 they all attonce upon him laid, And sore beset on every side arownd, That nigh he breathlesse grew, yet nought dismaid,2 Ne ever to them yielded foot of grownd All had he lost much blood3 through many a wownd, But stoutly dealt his blowes, and every way To which he turned in his wrathfull stownd,4 Made them recoile, and fly from dredd decay,5 That none of all the six before, him durst assay.6

22

Like dastard Curres, that having at a bay7 The salvage beast embost8 in wearie chace, Dare not adventure on the stubborne pray, Ne byte before,9 but rome from place to place, To get a snatch, when turned is his face. In such distresse and doubtfull jeopardy, When Britomart him saw, she ran apace Unto his reskew, and with earnest cry, Badd10 those same six forbeare that single enimy.

23

But to her cry they list11 not lenden eare, Ne ought the more their mightie strokes surceasse,12 But gathering him rownd about more neare, Their direfull rancour rather did encreasse; Till that she rushing through the thickest preasse,13 Perforce disparted their compacted gyre,14

1

Mainely: mightily. dismaid: having lost all moral courage; defeated; appalled; discouraged. In addition, especially in this book about chastity, this word usually hints at a pun on “dismaid” (made no longer a maid; deflowered). Virgins of either sex could be referred to as maids. 3 All had he: even though he had; blood: as Quitslund points out, it is worth noticing that throughout the poem, blood has associations with violence, vitality, love, desire, nourishment, fecundity, kinship, race, and holy communion (2006, online discussion). 2

4

13

stownd: attack. decay: death. 6 assay: put to the test, attack. 7 at a bay: at bay. 8 embost: exhausted and foaming at the mouth. 9 before: to his face. 10 Badd: bade. 11 list: wished. 12 surceasse: cease. 13 preasse: press, crowd. 14 Perforce: by force; compacted gyre: circling mass. 5

14

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

And soone compeld to hearken unto peace: Tho gan she myldly of them to inquyre The cause of their dissention and outrageous yre. 24

Whereto that single knight did answere frame; “These six would me enforce by oddes1 of might, To chaunge my liefe,2 and love another Dame, That death me liefer were, then such despight,3 So unto wrong to yield my wrested right: For I love one, the truest one on grownd,4 Ne list me chaunge; she th’Errant damzell 5 hight, For whose deare sake full many a bitter stownd, I have endurd, and tasted many a bloody wownd.”

25

“Certes”6 (said she) “then beene ye sixe to blame, To weene your wrong by force to justify: For knight to leave his Lady were great shame, That faithful is,7 and better were to dy. All losse is lesse, and lesse the infamy, Then losse of love to him, that loves but one; Ne may love be compeld by maistery;8 For soone as maistery comes, sweet love anone9 Taketh his nimble winges, and soone away is gone.”

26

Then spake one of those six, “There dwelleth here Within this castle wall a Lady fayre, Whose soveraine beautie hath no living pere,10 Thereto so bounteous and so debonayre,11 That never any mote with her compayre. She hath ordaind this law, which we approve,12

1

oddes: statistical advantage. liefe: preference for a particular woman. 3 liefer: preferable; despight: contempt. 4 on grownd: in the world. 5 Una, who has appeared in Book One, embodies religious truth. She errs literally rather than morally, wandering in search of her beloved. So does Britomart, of course. 6 Certes: certainly. 2

7

Refers to the Lady, but the meaning spills over to the knight. 8 Despite her self-assured tone here, Britomart spends much of Book Three trying to figure out what the relationship between mastery and love is or should be. 9 anone: anon, right away. 10 pere: peer. 11 debonayre: gracious. 12 approve: enforce.

Canto One

15

That every knight, which doth this way repayre,1 In case he have no Lady, nor no love, Shall doe unto her service2 never to remove. 27

“But if he have a Lady or a Love, Then must he her forgoe with fowle defame, Or else with us by dint of sword approve,3 That she is fairer, then our fairest Dame, As did this knight, before ye hether came.” “Perdy”4 (said Britomart) “the choise is hard: But what reward had he, that overcame?” “He should advaunced bee to high regard,” (Said they) “and have our Ladies love for his reward.5

28

“Therefore a read6 Sir, if thou have a love.” “Love have I sure,” (quoth she) “but Lady none; Yet will I not fro mine owne love remove, Ne to your Lady will I service done, But wreake your wronges wrought to this knight alone, And prove his cause.” With that her mortall speare She mightily aventred7 towards one, And downe him smot, ere well aware he weare, Then to the next she rode, and downe the next did beare.

29

Ne did she stay, till three on ground she layd, That none of them himselfe could reare againe; The fourth was by that other knight dismayd, All8 were he wearie of his former paine, That now there do but two of six remaine; Which two did yield, before she did them smight. “Ah” (said she then) “now may ye all see plaine, That truth is strong, and trew love most of might, That for his trusty servaunts doth so strongly fight.”

1

repayre: come. her: our lady; service: the service of a knight to his lady. 3 approve: put to the test. 4 Perdy: mild oath, literally “by God” (French par dieu). 5 The delicious humor of multiple choices that all lead in the same direction is the 2

mark of the Lady’s single-minded lust, but the chaste Britomart will herself experience situations in which apparent choices turn out to mask forces that are nearly irresistible. 6 a read: reveal. 7 aventred: aimed. 8 All: even though, even if.

16

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

30

“Too well we see,” (saide they) “and prove too well Our faulty weakenes,1 and your matchlesse might: For thy,2 faire Sir, yours be the Damozell, Which by her owne law to your lot doth light, And we your liegemen faith unto you plight.”3 So underneath her feet their swords they mard,4 And after her besought, well as they might, To enter in, and reape the dew reward: She graunted, and then in they all together far’d.

31

Long were it to describe the goodly frame,5 And stately port6 of Castle Joyeous, (For so that Castle hight7 by commun name) Where they were entertaynd with courteous And comely glee8 of many gratious Faire Ladies, and of many a gentle knight, Who through a Chamber long and spacious, Eftsoones9 them brought unto their Ladies sight, That of them cleeped10 was the Lady of delight.

32

But for to tell the sumptuous aray Of that great chamber, should be labour lost: For living wit, I weene, cannot display The roiall riches and exceeding cost, Of every pillour and of every post; Which all of purest bullion framed were, And with great perles and pretious stones embost, That the bright glister of their beames cleare Did sparckle forth great light, and glorious did appeare.

33

These stranger knights through passing, forth were led Into an inner rowme, whose royaltee And rich purveyance might uneath be red;11 Mote Princes place be seeme so deckt to bee.

1 Like his frequent double negatives, Spenser’s “faulty” intensifies “weakenes” rather than compromising it. 2 For thy: therefore. 3 I.e., pledge ourselves to serve you. 4 mard: marred; destroyed. 5 frame: construction.

6

port: appearance. hight: is called. 8 comely glee: good cheer. 9 Eftsoones: afterward; soon afterward. 10 cleeped: called. 11 uneath: scarcely; red: described. 7

Canto One

17

Which stately manner when as they did see, The image of superfluous riotize, Exceeding much the state of meane degree,1 They greatly wondred, whence so sumpteous guize2 Might be maintaynd, and each gan diversely devize. 34

The wals were round about appareiled With costly clothes of Arras and of Toure,3 In which with cunning hand was pourtrahed The love of Venus and her Paramoure, The fayre Adonis, turned to a flowre,4 A worke of rare device,5 and wondrous wit. First did it shew the bitter balefull stowre,6 Which her assayd with many a fervent fit, When first her tender hart was with his beautie smit.

35

Then with what sleights and sweet allurements she Entyst the Boy,7 as well that art she knew, And wooed him her Paramoure to bee; Now making girlonds of each flowre that grew, To crowne his golden lockes with honour dew; Now leading him into a secret shade

1

meane degree: inferior or low social status; middling social status. 2 guize: appearance, manner of living—but with overtones of pretense and disguise. 3 I.e., tapestries. Like Homer and Virgil, Spenser uses elaborately representational works of art to depict entire scenes that allegorize, or otherwise comment upon, major characters. Spenser also uses such works of art to comment upon the allegorical relationships among their makers, their owners, and their audiences. Cf. the different depictions of Venus in Cantos Six (in which the work of art is arguably the garden itself ) and Eleven (in which the issues of ownership and authorship are particularly complex). 4 In Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Venus falls in love with a mortal youth, Adonis, and

warns him not to risk his life by going hunting. He ignores her advice and dies after being gored in the groin by a wild boar. Heartsick, Venus changes his blood into an anemone flower, which is reborn every year for a brief period (10.524–739). In some Greek versions of the story, Zeus grants Aphrodite her wish that Adonis’ spirit or resurrected self be able to spend half of each year with her. 5 device: design and artistry. 6 stowre: tumult. 7 Cf. Venus’ wooing of Adonis with Britomart’s going on a quest to find her beloved, Artegall. The poem hints at the purpose of Britomart’s quest in stanza 54, but reveals it fully only in the following canto.

18

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

From his Beauperes,1 and from bright heavens vew, Where him to sleepe she gently would perswade, Or bathe him in a fountaine by some covert glade. 36

And whilst he slept, she over him would spred Her mantle, colour’d like the starry skyes, And her soft arme lay underneath his hed, And with ambrosiall kisses bathe his eyes; And whilst he bath’d, with her two crafty spyes,2 She secretly would search each daintie3 lim, And throw into the well sweet Rosemaryes, And fragrant violets, and Paunces4 trim, And ever with sweet Nectar she did sprinkle him.

37

So did she steale his heedelesse hart away, And joyd5 his love in secret unespyde. But for she saw him bent6 to cruell play, To hunt the salvage7 beast in forrest wyde, Dreadfull8 of daunger, that mote him betyde, She oft and oft adviz’d him to refraine From chase of greater beastes, whose brutish pryde Mote breede him scath9 unwares: but all in vaine; For who can shun the chance, that dest’ny doth ordaine?10

38

Lo, where beyond he lyeth languishing, Deadly engored of a great wilde Bore, And by his side the Goddesse groveling Makes for him endlesse mone, and evermore With her soft garment wipes away the gore, Which staynes his snowy skin with hatefull hew:11 But when she saw no helpe might him restore, Him to a dainty flowre she did transmew, Which in that cloth was wrought, as if it lively grew.

1

7

2

8

Beauperes: peers, friends. crafty spyes: spying eyes. 3 daintie: delightful; precious; choice. 4 Paunces: pansies. 5 joyd: enjoyed; had intercourse with. 6 bent: inclined.

salvage: savage; wild. Dreadfull: feeling dread of. 9 scath: harm. 10 An apt question for Britomart, as well. 11 hew: hue.

Canto One

39

So was that chamber clad in goodly wize, And rownd about it many beds were dight,1 As whylome was the antique worldes guize, Some for untimely2 ease, some for delight, As pleased them to use, that use it might: And all was full of Damzels, and of Squyres, Dauncing and reveling both day and night, And swimming deepe in sensuall desyres, And Cupid still3 emongest them kindled lustfull fyres.

40

And all the while sweet Musicke did divide4 Her looser notes with Lydian harmony;5 And all the while sweet birdes thereto applide Their daintie6 layes and dulcet melody, Ay caroling of love and jollity, That wonder was to heare their trim consort.7 Which when those knights beheld, with scornefull eye, They sdeigned8 such lascivious disport, And loath’d the loose demeanure9 of that wanton sort.

41

Thence10 they were brought to that great Ladies vew, Whom they found sitting on a sumptuous bed, That glistred all with gold and glorious shew, As the proud Persian11 Queenes accustomed: She seemd a woman of great bountihed, And of rare beautie, saving that askaunce

1

7

2

8

dight: made ready. untimely: at inappropriate times. 3 still: constantly, always. 4 divide: descant. 5 Lydian harmony: musical mode used in ancient Greece and associated with effeminate sensuality. 6 daintie: delightful.

19

trim consort: well-arranged harmony. sdeigned: disdained. 9 demeanure: demeanor. 10 Thence: from there. 11 Western Europe associated eastern regions with effeminate luxury. (For their part, and with some justification, Asia and the Arabic world often regarded Western Europe as boorish and crude.)

20

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

Her wanton eyes, ill signes of womanhed, Did roll too highly,1 and too often glaunce, Without regard of grace, or comely amenaunce.2 42

Long worke it were, and needlesse to devize3 Their goodly entertainement and great glee: She caused them be led in courteous wize Into a bowre, disarmed for to be,4 And cheared well with wine and spiceree: The Redcrosse Knight was soone disarmed there, But the brave Mayd5 would not disarmed bee, But onely vented up her umbriere,6 And so did let her goodly visage to appere.7

43

As when fayre Cynthia,8 in darkesome night, Is in a noyous9 cloud enveloped, Where she may finde the substance thin and light, Breakes forth her silver beames, and her bright hed Discovers to the world discomfited;10 Of the poore traveiler, that went astray, With thousand blessings she is heried;11 Such was the beautie and the shining ray, With which fayre Britomart gave light unto the day.

1 Rather than rolling her eyes in circles, the Lady is rolling them to the side, a comehither look. Ideally, women were supposed to keep their eyes demurely cast down; Spenser’s speaker praises his bride for doing so in Epithalamion, stanza 9. 2 amenaunce: noble bearing. 3 devize: describe. 4 Allegorically, to doff one’s armor is to let down one’s guard. 5 Mayd: virgin; unmarried woman (presumed virginal). 6 umbriere: the hinged visor of a helmet, which covers the face when lowered. 7 In this canto, Spenser skillfully plays allegorical resonance against practical experience. In stanzas 42 through 51, the poem remains committed to the allegorical signif-

icance of Britomart’s virtuously keeping on her armor of chastity, while at the same time leading us to smile at the image of her sitting down to a banquet in full armor, helmet and all. The latter image does not undercut the former so much as it complicates it: Britomart must learn that chastity is anything but a straightforward, easily deployed virtue. 8 Cynthia is another name for Artemis, goddess of the moon, which was associated both with chastity and with earthly inconstancy. Spenser and Raleigh had both used the name Cynthia to praise Elizabeth. 9 noyous: annoying. 10 Discovers: discloses; the world discomfited: the world that had been robbed of comfort (while she was covered). 11 heried: glorified.

Canto One

44

And eke those six, which lately with her fought, Now were disarmd, and did them selves present Unto her vew, and company unsought; For they all seemed courteous and gent, And all sixe brethen, borne of one parent, Which had them traynd in all civilitee, And goodly taught to tilt and turnament; Now were they liegmen to this Ladie free,1 And her knights service ought, to hold of her in fee.2

45

The first of them by name Gardante 3 hight, A jolly4 person, and of comely vew; The second was Parlante, a bold knight, And next to him Jocante did ensew; Basciante did him selfe most courteous shew; But fierce Bacchante seemd too fell and keene; And yett in armes5 Noctante greater grew: All were faire knights, and goodly well beseene,6 But to faire Britomart they all but shadowes7 beene.

46

For shee was full of amiable grace, And manly terror mixed therewithall, That as the one stird up affections bace, So th’other did mens rash desires apall, And hold them backe, that would in error fall; As hee, that hath espide a vermeill Rose, To which sharpe thornes and breres the way forstall,8 Dare not for dread his hardy hand expose, But wishing it far off, his ydle wish doth lose.

1

free: bountiful and, unlike her knights, beholden to no one. 2 in fee: feudal term designating the service that a knight owed to his lord or lady. 3 The knights are named for the six stages of lechery: gazing, conversing, dallying, kissing, carousing, and keeping late nights. 4

jolly: sprightly; gallant; brave; splendid; handsome; pleasant; lustful.

5

21

in armes: punning on arms as armour and a lover’s arms. 6 beseene: nice to look at. 7 shadowes: the word can mean shadows, illusions, ghosts, or reflections in a mirror. In the next canto, we see that Britomart herself has fallen in love with an image in a mirror. 8 forstall: impede.

22

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

47

Whom when the Lady saw so faire a wight, All ignorant of her contrary1 sex, (For shee her weend a fresh and lusty2 knight) Shee greatly gan enamoured to wex,3 And with vaine4 thoughts her falsed fancy vex: Her fickle hart conceived hasty fyre, Like sparkes of fire, that fall in sclender flex,5 That shortly brent6 into extreme desyre, And ransackt all her veines with passion entyre.

48

Eftsoones7 shee grew to great impatience And into termes of open outrage brust,8 That plaine discovered her incontinence,9 Ne reckt shee, who her meaning did mistrust;10 For she was given all to fleshly lust, And poured forth11 in sensuall delight, That all regard of shame she had discust,12 And meet13 respect of honor putt to flight: So shamelesse beauty soone becomes a loathly sight.

49

Faire Ladies, that to love captived arre, And chaste desires doe nourish in your mind, Let not her fault your sweete affections marre, Ne blott the bounty of all womankind; ‘Mongst thousands good one wanton Dame to find: Emongst the Roses grow some wicked weeds; For this was not to love, but lust inclind; For love does alwaies bring forth bounteous deeds And in each gentle hart desire of honor breeds.

1

Contrary, that is, to the Lady’s assumptions and desires. 2 lusty: vigorous, but perhaps also lustful. 3 wex: grow. 4 vaine: empty, in vain. 5 sclender flex: slender flax—presumably a field of dessicated, combustible material. 6 brent: burned. 7 Eftsoones: afterward; soon afterward.

8

brust: burst. incontinence: lack of sexual temperance; lack of temperance in general. 10 mistrust: suspect. 11 Spenser consistently associates pouring forth with sexual looseness. 12 discust: shaken off. 13 meet: appropriate. 9

Canto One

50

Nought so of love this looser Dame did skill,1 But as a cole to kindle fleshly flame, Giving the bridle to her wanton will, And treading under foote her honest name: Such love is hate, and such desire is shame. Still did she rove at her2 with crafty glaunce Of her false eies, that at her hart did ayme, And told her meaning in her countenaunce; But Britomart dissembled it with ignoraunce.3

51

Supper was shortly dight4 and downe they satt, Where they were served with all sumptuous fare, Whiles fruitfull Ceres, and Ly æus5 fatt Pourd out their plenty, without spight6 or spare: Nought wanted there, that dainty7 was and rare; And aye8 the cups their bancks did overflow, And aye betweene the cups, she did prepare Way to her love, and secret darts did throw; But Britomart would not such guilfull message know.

52

So when they slaked had the fervent heat Of appetite with meates9 of every sort, The Lady did faire Britomart entreat, Her to disarme, and with delightfull sport To loose her warlike limbs and strong effort, But when shee mote not thereunto be wonne, (For shee her sexe under that straunge purport Did use to hide, and plaine apparaunce shonne:)10 In playner wise to tell her grievaunce she11 begonne.

1

9

2

10

skill: have knowledge. at her: at Britomart. 3 Britomart pretends not to notice that her hostess is burning with love. 4 dight: prepared. 5 Ceres: goddess of grain; Lyæus: god of wine. 6 spight: grudge. 7 dainty: precious; choice. 8 aye: constantly, always.

23

meates: food. Britomart will not disarm, because she still wants everyone to believe she is a man. 11 The Lady––though this is one of the passages in which Spenser bounces us from pronoun to pronoun until we must fight to keep our place. Here, the confused pronouns might make us wonder whether the distinction that the narrator is making between the two women is, after all, absolute.

24

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

53

And all attonce discovered her desire With sighes, and sobs, and plaints, and piteous griefe, The outward sparkes of her inburning fire; Which spent in vaine, at last she told her briefe, That but if 1 she did lend her short reliefe, And doe her comfort, she mote algates2 dye. But the chaste damzell, that had never priefe3 Of such malengine4 and fine forgerye, Did easely beleeve her strong extremitye.

54

Full easy was for her to have beliefe, Who by self-feeling of her feeble sexe, And by long triall of the inward griefe, Wherewith imperious love her hart did vexe, Could judge what paines doe loving harts perplexe.5 Who meanes no guile, be-guiled soonest shall, And to faire semblaunce doth light faith annexe; The bird, that knowes not the false fowlers call, Into his hidden nett full easely doth fall.

55

For thy6 she would not in discourteise wise, Scorne the faire offer of good will profest; For great rebuke it is, love to despise, Or rudely sdeigne a gentle harts request; But with faire countenaunce, as beseemed best, Her entertaynd; nath’lesse shee inly deemd Her love too light, to wooe a wandring guest: Which she misconstruing, thereby esteemd That from like inward fire that outward smoke had steemd.7

1

but if: unless. her comfort: satisfy her desire; algates: at any rate. 3 priefe: experience. 2

4

malengine: evil machination. It is easy for Britomart to believe that the Lady is burning with the same sort of love that Britomart feels (for someone else). Thus Britomart’s very innocence makes her vulnerable to the Lady’s lustful plotting. 6 For thy: therefore. 5

7

As befits a courtly knight, Britomart does not insult the Lady by refusing her outright; and even though Britomart privately considers the Lady too forward, Britomart’s own experiences with burning love make her believe that the Lady’s intentions match her own chaste ones. The picture of Britomart’s innocence is complicated, however, by Britomart’s dissembling in this passage (pretending to be a man) and by her inability in the following canto to understand the moral status of her own erotic desires.

Canto One

56

Therewith a while she her flit1 fancy fedd, Till she mote winne fit time for her desire, But yet her wound still inward freshly bledd, And through her bones the false instilled fire Did spred it selfe, and venime close inspire. Tho2 were the tables taken all away, And every knight, and every gentle Squire Gan choose his dame with Bascimano 3 gay, With whom he ment to make his sport and courtly play.

57

Some fell to daunce, some fel to hazardry,4 Some to make love, some to make meryment, As diverse witts to diverse things apply; And all the while faire Malecasta 5 bent Her crafty engins6 to her close intent. By this th’eternall lampes,7 wherewith high Jove Doth light the lower world, were halfe yspent, And the moist daughters of huge Atlas8 strove Into the Ocean deepe to drive their weary drove.

58

High time it seemed then for everie wight Them to betake unto their kindly rest; Eftesoones long waxen torches weren light, Unto their bowres to guyden every guest: Tho when the Britonesse saw all the rest Avoided quite, she gan her selfe despoile,9

1

she: the Lady’s, but the pronouns are doing a dance; flit: fleeting, inconstant. 2 Tho: then. 3 Bascimano: Italian bascio le mani, kissing the hands. 4 hazardry: playing at dice. 5 Malecasta: for the first time, we read the Lady’s name; it means, in Italian, “badly chaste.” Although Spenser often waits to reveal a character’s name until we have begun to figure out from the character’s actions what sort of virtues or vices he or she embodies, more development of the character often follows. In this case, we know by now

25

just how bad Malecasta is. The critical question is whether this evil portrait is sharpened by the remainder of this canto, or whether her nature becomes less clear. 6 engins: machinations. 7 lampes: stars. 8 moist daughters of huge Atlas: the Hyades, a group of stars traditionally thought to bring rain. 9 Avoided: having exited the room; despoile: undress. This is the word most often used to describe taking a foe’s armor as a trophy after killing him. Allegorically, she is letting down her guard.

26

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

And safe committ to her soft fethered nest, Wher through long watch, and late daies weary toile, She soundly slept, and carefull thoughts did quite assoile.1 59

Now whenas all the world in silence deepe Yshrowded was, and every mortall wight Was drowned in the depth of deadly sleepe,2 Faire Malecasta, whose engrieved spright3 Could find no rest in such perplexed plight, Lightly arose out of her wearie bed, And under the blacke vele of guilty Night, Her with a scarlott mantle covered, That was with gold and Ermines4 faire enveloped.

60

Then panting soft, and trembling every joynt, Her fearfull feete towards the bowre she mov’d. Where she for secret purpose did appoynt To lodge the warlike maide5 unwisely loov’d, And to her bed approching, first she proov’d,6 Whether she slept or wakte, with her softe hand She softely felt, if any member7 moov’d, And lent her wary eare to understand, If any puffe of breath, or signe of sence shee fond.

61

Which whenas none she fond, with easy shifte,8 For feare least her unwares she should abrayd,9 Th’embroderd quilt she lightly up did lifte,

1

assoile: set free. The passage is also peripherally informed by other meanings of the word: to acquit; to absolve. 2 The round vowels and liquid consonants convey the drowsy mood. 3 spright: spirit. 4 Ermines were emblems both of chastity and of sexual incontinence; Spenser uses them in both senses in Britomart’s book. Ermines were traditionally worn by royalty, and they had become especially associated with the Virgin Queen. 5 maide: virgin; unmarried woman (presumed virginal). 6 proov’d: tested.

7

member: limb, but with the obvious double entendre. Malecasta is afraid the knight will move his limbs at her touch, awaken, and wish her gone; but Malecasta wouldn’t mind if the knight’s specifically male member were to move, signifying the knight’s desire for her to stay. The eroticism of this passage comes partly from the heterosexual image in Malecasta’s head and partly from an entirely hypothetical image available only to us: that of the female Britomart waking and feeling lust for the female Malecasta. We know this will not happen, but Spenser teases us to imagine it. 8 easy shifte: careful motion. 9 abrayd: startle.

Canto One

27

And by her side her selfe she softly layd, Of every finest fingers touch affrayd; Ne any noise she made, ne word she spake, But inly sigh’d.1 At last the royall Mayd Out of her quiet slomber did awake, And chaungd her weary side,2 the better ease to take. 62

Where feeling one close couched by her side, She lightly lept out of her filed3 bedd, And to her weapon ran, in minde to gride4 The loathed leachour. But the Dame5 halfe dedd Through suddein feare and ghastly drerihedd,6 Did shrieke alowd, that through the hous it rong, And the whole family therewith adredd, Rashly out of their rouzed couches7 sprong, And to the troubled chamber all in armes did throng.

63

And those sixe knights that ladies Champions, And eke the Redcrosse knight ran to the stownd, Halfe armd and halfe unarmd, with them attons:8 Where when confusedly they came, they fownd Their lady lying on the sencelesse grownd; On thother side, they saw the warlike Mayd Al in her snow-white smocke,9 with locks unbownd, Threatning the point of her avenging blaed, That with so troublous terror they were all dismayd.10

64

About their Ladye first they flockt arownd, Whom having laid in comfortable couch, Shortly they reard out of her frosen swownd;11 And afterwardes they gan with fowle reproch

1 The stanza slows to a quiet halt, the calm before the storm. 2 I.e., turned over. 3 filed: defiled. 4 gride: pierce through. 5 Dame: Malecasta. 6 drerihedd: dreariness. 7 rouzed couches: Spenser is a master of transferred epithets: “wearie bed,” “guilty Night,” “rouzed couches,” “sencelesse grownd.”

8

attons: all at once smocke: though no longer in her armor of chastity, Britomart still wears a virginal white smock (an undergarment used by both sexes as sleeping attire). 10 dismayd: defeated; appalled; discouraged. But again, the word puns on “dismaid.” 11 swownd: swoon. 9

28

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

To stirre up strife, and troublous contecke1 broch: But by ensample of the last dayes losse, None of them rashly durst to her approch, Ne in so glorious spoile themselves embosse,2 Her succourd eke the Champion of the bloody Crosse.3 65

But one of those sixe knights, Gardante hight, Drew out a deadly bow and arrow keene, Which forth he sent with felonous despight, And fell intent against the virgin sheene:4 The mortall steele stayd not, till it was seene To gore her side, yet was the wound not deepe, But lightly rased5 her soft silken skin, That drops of purple blood thereout did weepe, Which did her lilly smock with staines of vermeil steep.6

66

Wherewith enrag’d, she fiercely at them flew, And with her flaming sword about her layd, That none of them foule mischiefe could eschew,7 But with her dreadfull strokes were all dismayd: Here, there, and every where about her swayd Her wrathfull steele, that none mote it abyde; And eke the Redcrosse knight gave her good ayd, Ay joyning foot to foot, and syde to syde, That in short space their foes they have quite terrifyde.

67

Tho8 whenas all were put to shamefull flight, The noble Britomartis her arayd,

1

contecke: contention. spoile: booty; embosse: cover themselves (in the glory of conquering her virginity). 3 Redcrosse comes to her aid. 4 sheene: shining, gorgeous. 5 rased: grazed. 6 The plot eventually makes it clear that Britomart has not actually lost her virginity, but this wound, however slight, is clearly sexual. As the next canto will show, Spenser’s ideas of chastity can accommodate both erotic desire and the emotional wounds that result from such desire. Critics 2

debate the extent to which Spenser wants us to imagine any fault in Britomart’s responses to Malecasta’s invasion of her bed. In a world in which virginity is considered an unmarried woman’s most precious commodity, is Britomart to be commended for her vigorous defense of her person, or are we meant to smile at her naïve belief that Malecasta is utterly monstrous? And what is the relationship of this wound to Adonis’s wound—or to Amoret’s wounds in xii.19–21 and IV.vii.27? 7 8

eschew: escape. Tho: then.

Canto One

And her bright armes about her body dight: For nothing would she lenger there be stayd, Where so loose life, and so ungentle trade1 Was usd of knights and Ladies seeming gent: So earely ere the grosse Earthes gryesy2 shade, Was all disperst out of the firmament, They tooke their steeds, and forth upon their journey went.

1

ungentle trade: interactions inappropriate for gentlemen and gentlewomen.

2

gryesy: gray and grim.

29

Canto Two The Redcrosse knight to Britomart describeth Artegall: The wondrous myrrhour, by which she in love with him did fall.

1

Here have I cause, in men just blame to find, That in their proper1 praise too partiall bee, And not indifferent2 to woman kind, To whom no share in armes and chevalree, They doe impart, ne maken memoree Of their brave gestes3 and prowesse martiall; Scarse doe they spare to one or two or three,4 Rowme in their writtes; yet the same writing small5 Does all their deedes deface, and dims their glories all,

2

But by record of antique times I finde, That wemen wont in warres to beare most sway, And to all great exploites them selves inclind: Of which they still the girlond6 bore away, Till envious Men fearing their rules decay, Gan coyne streight7 lawes to curb their liberty, Yet sith they warlike armes have laide away, They have exceld in artes and pollicy,8 That now we foolish men that prayse gin9 eke t’envy.

3

Of warlike puissaunce in ages spent,10 Be thou faire Britomart, whose prayse I wryte, But of all wisedom bee thou precedent,

1

5

proper: own. indifferent: impartial. 3 gestes: exploits; stories about their exploits. 4 One thinks of Penthesilea and Camilla in Virgil’s Aeneid, of Bradamante in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso, and of Clorinda in Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata.

writtes: writings; small: the same sparse treatment; the same belittling treatment. 6 girlond: the victor’s wreath. 7 streight: strait, restrictively narrow. 8 pollicy: government. 9 gin: begin. 10 spent: passed.

2

30

Canto Two

31

O soveraine Queene,1 whose prayse I would endyte, Endite I would as dewtie doth excyte; But ah my rymes too rude and rugged arre, When in so high an object they doe lyte, And striving, fit to make,2 I feare doe marre: Thy selfe thy prayses tell, and make them knowen farre. 4

She traveiling with Guyon3 by the way, Of sondry thinges faire purpose4 gan to find, T’abridg their journey long, and lingring day; Mongst which it fell into that Fairies5 mind, To aske this Briton Maid, what uncouth wind, Brought her into those partes, and what inquest6 Made her dissemble her disguised kind:7 Faire Lady she him seemd, like Lady drest, But fairest knight alive, when armed was her brest.

5

Thereat she sighing softly, had no powre To speake a while, ne ready answere make, But with hart-thrilling throbs and bitter stowre,8 As if she had a fever fitt, did quake, And every daintie limbe with horrour shake, And ever and anone the rosy red, Flasht through her face, as it had beene a flake9 Of lightning, through bright heven fulmined;10 At last the passion past she thus him answered.

6

“Faire Sir, I let you weete,11 that from the howre I taken was from nourses tender pap,12 I have beene trained up in warlike stowre, To tossen speare and shield, and to affrap13

1 soveraine Queene: Elizabeth I, for whom The Faerie Queene is an elaborate compliment. 2 Poets were sometimes called “makers.” 3 She: Britomart; Guyon: this name is clearly an error for “Redcrosse.” 4 purpose: conversation. 5 Fairies: Redcrosse’s. 6 inquest: quest, with the implication that Britomart’s quest is an inner one. 7 kind: sex (female).

8

thrilling: piercing; stowre: tumult. flake: flash. 10 fulmined: flashed forth. 11 I let you weete: I’ll let you know. 9

12

pap: breast (that of a wet nurse). affrap: strike. This is one of Spenser’s wonderfully backward-looking neologisms —more Chaucerian than Elizabethan, yet new to the world. He is thinking of the Italian affrappare, but his version is sturdily Anglo-Saxon in sound. 13

32

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

The warlike ryder to his most mishap;1 Sithence I loathed have my life to lead, As Ladies wont, in pleasures wanton lap, To finger the fine needle and nyce2 thread; Me lever were3 with point of foemans speare be dead. 7

“All my delight on deedes of armes is sett, To hunt out perilles and adventures hard, By sea, by land, where so they may be mett, Onely for honour and for high regard, Without respect of richesse or reward. For such intent into these partes I came, Withouten compasse, or withouten card, Far fro my native soyle, that is by name The greater Brytayne,4 here to seeke for praise and fame.

8

“Fame blazed hath, that here in Faery lond Doe many famous knightes and Ladies wonne,5 And many straunge adventures to bee fond, Of which great worth and worship6 may be wonne; Which I to prove, this voyage have begonne. But mote I weet7 of you, right courteous knight, Tydings of one, that hath unto me donne Late foule dishonour and reprochfull spight,8 The which I seeke to wreake, and Arthegall 9 he hight.”

1

mishap: misfortune. nyce: fine, with ironic overtones of uselessness. 3 Me lever were: I would rather. 4 greater Brytayne: to distinguish it from the lesser Britain, i.e., Brittany (a region of France). Here, the term refers to Wales (rather than to England or to all of the territory formerly inhabited by the Britons). 5 wonne: dwell. 6 worship: admiration. 7 weet: learn. 8 Doing dishonor to a male knight can mean any of a number of things; however, now that Redcrosse knows Britomart is a woman (having seen her in her smock in Malecasta’s house), her claim that Artegall has done her dishonor can mean only one of two things: that he tried to rape her or 2

that he succeeded in doing so. As the next stanza indicates, she is lying here, and indeed, her whole account of her childhood is a lie. Spenser deftly manages the psychological nuances of this passage, reminding us of just how much Britomart still has to learn: she is like a fifth-grader who declares largely that she hates boys, especially that particular boy—just so she can have the excuse to say that boy’s name. Then again, there is a large element of truth in Britomart’s story, given that the image of Artegall has erotically penetrated and wounded her heart. We learn the details of this wounding in stanzas 22 through 39; see especially 29 through 39. 9 Arthegall: also spelled “Artegall.” His name includes elements of “Arthur” (implying a relationship to, though not identity with, Prince Arthur) and of “equality”

Canto Two

9

33

The word gone out, she backe againe would call, As her repenting so to have missayd, But that he it uptaking ere the fall, Her shortly answered; “Faire martiall Mayd Certes ye misavised beene, t’upbrayd, A gentle1 knight with so unknightly blame: For weet ye well of all, that ever playd At tilt or tourney, or like warlike game, The noble Arthegall hath ever borne the name.2

10 “For thy3 great wonder were it, if such shame Should ever enter in his bounteous thought, Or ever doe, that4 mote deserven blame: The noble corage5 never weeneth ought, That may unworthy of it selfe be thought. Therefore, faire Damzell, be ye well aware, Least6 that too farre ye have your sorrow sought: You and your countrey both I wish welfare,7 And honour both; for each of other worthy are.” 11 The royall Maid woxe inly wondrous glad, To heare her Love so highly magnifyde, And joyd that ever she affixed had, Her hart on knight so goodly glorifyde, How ever finely8 she it faind to hyde: The loving mother, that nine monethes did beare, In the deare closett9 of her painefull syde, Her tender babe, it seeing safe appeare, Doth not so much rejoyce, as she rejoyced theare.10

(since he will turn out to be the hero of the Book of Justice, Book Five). Spenser also signals the couple’s appropriateness for each other by beginning Artegall’s name where Britomart’s ends, with “art.” 1 gentle: noble, virtuous. 2 I.e., for understand this well, that from all challengers who ever played in any tournament, the noble Artegall has always won the prize. Here Redcrosse equates martial prowess with moral goodness, implying that no one so courageous in tournaments could be so low as to commit a rape.

3

For thy: therefore. that: that which. 5 corage: heart as the seat of emotion and thought, but with puns on the meanings “sexual vigor” and “lust.” 4

6

Least: lest. welfare: fare well. 8 finely: cleverly. 9 closett: private room; womb. 10 After months of wondering whether Artegall is merely a figment of her own imagination, Britomart is relieved to see 7

34

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

12 But to occasion him to further talke, To feed her humor with his pleasing style, Her list in stryfull termes with him to balke,1 And thus replyde, “How ever, Sir, ye fyle2 Your courteous tongue, his prayses to compyle, It ill beseemes a knight of gentle sort, Such as ye have him boasted, to beguyle A simple maide, and worke so hainous tort, In shame of knighthood, as I largely can report. 13 “Let bee therefore my vengeaunce to disswade, And read, where I that faytour3 false may find.” “Ah, but if reason faire might you perswade, To slake your wrath, and mollify your mind,” (Said he) “perhaps ye should it better find: For hardie thing it is, to weene by might, That man to hard conditions to bind, Or ever hope to match in equall fight, Whose prowesse paragone saw never living wight. 14 “Ne soothlich is it easie for to read,4 Where now on earth, or how he may be fownd; For he ne wonneth in one certeine stead,5 But restlesse walketh all the world arownd, Ay6 doing thinges, that to his fame redownd, Defending Ladies cause, and Orphans right, Where so he heares, that any7 doth confownd Them comfortlesse, through tyranny or might; So is his soveraine8 honour raisde to hevens hight.”

that he exists outside of her, as proven by the fact that Redcrosse knows him. Artegall appears to readers by degrees, as well: we catch hints of him in Canto One (blurred by their uncertain reflection in Malecasta’s version of desire), and we hear certainly of his existence here, but it will be several more stanzas before we can even begin to understand who he is or how Britomart knows about him. 1 to balke: to object to his arguments.

2

fyle: moral pamphlets often accused seducers and confidence men of metaphorically filing their tongues to make smooth talk. 3 read: inform me; faytour: impostor. 4 soothlich: truly, forsooth; read: find out. 5 ne wonneth: does not dwell; stead: place. 6 Ay: always. 7 any: anyone. 8 soveraine: excellent.

Canto Two

35

15 His feeling wordes her feeble sence much pleased, And softly sunck into her molten hart; Hart that is inly hurt, is greatly eased With hope of thing, that may allegge his1 smart; For pleasing wordes are like to Magick art, That doth the charmed Snake in slomber lay: Such secrete ease felt gentle Britomart, Yet list the same efforce with faind gainesay;2 So dischord ofte in Musick makes the sweeter lay.3 16 And sayd, “Sir knight, these ydle termes forbeare, And sith it is uneath4 to finde his haunt, Tell me some markes, by which he may appeare, If chaunce I him encounter paravaunt;5 For perdy6 one shall other slay, or daunt: What shape, what shield, what armes, what steed, what stedd,7 And what so else his person most may vaunt?”8 All which the Redcrosse knight to point aredd,9 And him in everie part before her fashioned. 17 Yet him in everie part before she knew, How ever list her now her knowledge fayne,10 Sith him whylome11 in Brytayne she did vew, To her revealed in a mirrhour playne, Whereof did grow her first engraffed12 payne, Whose root and stalke so bitter yet did taste, That but13 the fruit more sweetnes did contayne, Her wretched dayes in dolour she mote waste, And yield the pray14 of love to lothsome death at last.

1

allegge: alleviate; his: its. I.e., yet wanted to struggle against that secret sense of relief by pretending that she did not feel it.

2

3

lay: song. uneath: difficult. 5 paravaunt: by chance. 6 perdy: by God. 4

7 stedd: mark, as for example an heraldic device. 8

vaunt: proudly show. to point: precisely; aredd: explained. 10 fayne: feign. 11 whylome: while. 12 engraffed: engrafted. 13 but: unless. 14 pray: prey. 9

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

18 By straunge occasion1 she did him behold, And much more straungely gan to love his sight, As it in bookes hath written beene of old. In Deheubarth that now South-wales is hight, What time king Ryence2 raign’d, and dealed right, The great Magitien Merlin3 had deviz’d, By his deepe science, and hell-dreaded might, A looking glasse, right wondrously aguiz’d,4 Whose vertues through the wyde worlde soone were solemniz’d. 19 It vertue had, to shew in perfect sight, What ever thing was in the world contaynd, Betwixt the lowest earth and hevens hight, So that5 it to the looker appertaynd; What ever foe had wrought, or frend had faynd, Therein discovered was, ne ought6 mote pas, Ne ought in secret from the same remaynd; For thy7 it round and hollow shaped was, Like to the world it selfe, and seemd a world of glas. 20 Who wonders not, that reades8 so wonderous worke? But who does wonder, that has red the Towre, Wherein th’Aegyptian Phao9 long did lurke From all mens vew, that none might her discovre, Yet she might all men vew out of her bowre?

1

occasion: circumstance. Ryence: Britomart’s father. In Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur, King Ryons of North Wales trims a cloak with the beards of other kings, signifying that he has robbed them of their manhood (1.26). 3 Merlin: in Arthurian legend and in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s history, Merlin uses his knowledge of the art of magic to help King Uther Pendragon and his son, the famous Arthur. Among other feats, Merlin brings the stones to Stonehenge and makes the Round Table for Uther’s knights. Merlin’s name may have originated from Myrddhin, a semilegendary Welsh bard. 4 looking glasse: called “Venus looking glas” at i.8.9. It is described in two ways: 2

first as a mirror, then as a crystal ball. Queen Elizabeth regularly consulted an astrologer, John Dee, who used a crystal ball that is now in the British Museum; aguiz’d: guised, fashioned. 5 So that: so long as, with the proviso that. 6 discovered: disclosed; ought: aught, anything. 7 For thy: because. 8 reades: sees—but with a pun on reading a text. Spenser’s poem, like Merlin’s crystal ball, is a prophetic world in miniature. 9 Phao: her name comes from the Greek verb meaning “to shine.” See next note.

Canto Two

37

Great Ptolomæe it for his lemans1 sake Ybuilded all of glasse, by Magicke powre, And also it impregnable did make; Yet when his love was false, he with a peaze2 it brake. 21 Such was the glassy globe that Merlin made, And gave unto king Ryence for his gard, That never foes his kingdome might invade, But he it knew at home before he hard3 Tydings thereof, and so them still debar’d.4 It was a famous Present for a Prince, And worthy worke of infinite reward, That treasons could bewray, and foes convince;5 Happy this Realme, had6 it remayned ever since. 22 One day it fortuned, fayre Britomart Into her fathers closet7 to repayre; For nothing he from her reserv’d apart, Being his onely daughter and his hayre:8 Where when she had espyde that mirrhour fayre, Her selfe awhile therein she vewd in vaine; Tho her avizing9 of the vertues rare, Which thereof spoken were, she gan againe Her to bethinke of, that10 mote to her selfe pertaine. 23 But as it falleth,11 in the gentlest harts Imperious Love hath highest set his throne, And tyrannizeth in the bitter smarts Of them, that to him buxome are and prone:12 1

Ptolomæe: second-century Greek astronomer in Alexandria, who experimented with optics to explore the properties of light. Spenser imagines that Ptolemy had a beloved, Phao, for whom he built a glass tower––the magical optics of which allowed her to see out while preventing others from seeing in; lemans: beloved’s. 2 peaze: strong blow. 3 But he it knew: but that he would know it; hard: heard. 4 still debar’d: always barred their way.

5 bewray: disclose; convince: prove guilty. 6 had: if it had. 7 closet: private room. 8 hayre: heir. 9 avizing: reminding herself. 10 that: whatever. 11 falleth: happens. 12 buxome: favorable, welcoming; morally easy to bend; prone: inclined. The sexual overtones of these two terms in combination may be more evident to modern readers

38

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

So thought this Mayd (as maydens use to done) Whom fortune for her husband would allot, Not that she lusted after any one;1 For she was pure from blame of sinfull blot,2 Yet wist her life at last must lincke in that same knot.3 24 Eftsoones there was presented to her eye A comely knight, all arm’d in complete wize, Through whose bright ventayle4 lifted up on hye His manly face, that did his foes agrize,5 And frends to termes of gentle truce entize, Lookt foorth, as Phœbus face out of the east, Betwixt two shady mountaynes doth arize; Portly6 his person was, and much increast Through his Heroicke grace, and honorable gest.7 25 His crest was covered with a couchant8 Hownd, And all his armour seemd of antique mould,9 But wondrous massy and assured sownd, And round about yfretted10 all with gold, In which there written was with cyphres11 old, “Achilles armes, which Arthogall did win.”

than to those in the sixteenth century, when “buxom” had barely begun to acquire the additional meanings “full of health . . . well-favored, plump and comely” (OED a4). 1 any one: any particular person. 2 Sixteenth-century England was less repressive about women’s sexuality than was, say, England during the Victorian period. Romantic comedies celebrated unmarried women’s ability to love, even though such ability was generally couched in terms of its transgressive nature. According to many moral pamphlets, however, a woman was not supposed to feel erotic longing until after marriage—at which point it was actually thought necessary for her to experience sexual climax in order to conceive a child.

In this canto, Spenser raises questions about how we can define ideal chastity. Ultimately, he envisions chastity as a dynamic series of interactions with others and with oneself, rather than as a fixed state of mind and body. 3 knot: marriage union. 4 ventayle: visor and/or lower part of the helmet. 5 agrize: cause to shudder. 6 Portly: carried with dignity. 7 gest: bearing. 8 couchant: in heraldry, signifies an animal crouching and ready to pounce. 9 mould: pattern, style. 10 yfretted: ornamentally interlaced. 11 cyphres: letters.

Canto Two

39

And on his shield enveloped sevenfold He bore a crowned litle Ermilin,1 That deckt the azure field with her fayre pouldred2 skin. 26 The Damzell well did vew his Personage, And liked well, ne further fastned not,3 But went her way; ne her unguilty age Did weene, unwares, that her unlucky lot Lay hidden in the bottome of the pot; Of hurt unwist most daunger doth redound: But the false Archer,4 which that arrow shot So slyly, that she did not feele the wound, Did smyle full smoothly at her weetlesse5 wofull stound. 27 Thenceforth the fether in her lofty crest,6 Ruffed of love, gan lowly to availe,7 And her prowd portaunce, and her princely gest,8 With which she earst9 tryumphed, now did quaile: Sad, solemne, sowre, and full of fancies fraile She woxe;10 yet wist she nether how, nor why, She wist not, silly Mayd, what she did aile,11 Yet wist, she was not well at ease perdy, Yet thought it was not love, but some melancholy.12 28 So soone as Night had with her pallid13 hew Defaste14 the beautie of the shyning skye, And reft from men the worldes desired vew, She with her Nourse15 adowne to sleepe did lye; But sleepe full far away from her did fly: In stead thereof sad sighes, and sorrowes deepe 1

Ermilin: see i.59.n. pouldred: powdered (white). 3 ne further fastned not: thought no more of him (at least not consciously). 2

4

Archer: Cupid. weetlesse: unwitting. 6 crest: (on her helmet). 7 Ruffed of: ruffled by; availe: droop. 8 portaunce: carriage, mien; gest: bearing. 9 earst: previously. 10 woxe: waxed, grew. 5

11 silly: helpless; innocent; what she did aile: what ailed her. 12 melancholy: the early modern medical term for depression, supposed to be characteristic of lovers and of poets. 13

pallid: pale. Defaste: defaced. 15 In the richer families, a woman who nursed the children while they were young might remain as a companion and upper servant in later years. 14

40

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

Kept watch and ward1 about her warily, That nought she did but wayle, and often steepe Her dainty couch with teares, which closely2 she did weepe. 29 And if that any drop of slombring rest Did chaunce to still3 into her weary spright, When feeble nature felt her selfe opprest, Streight way with dreames, and with fantastick sight Of dreadfull things the same was put to flight, That oft out of her bed she did astart, As one with vew of ghastly feends affright: Tho gan she to renew her former smart, And thinke of that fayre visage, written in her hart. 30 One night, when she was tost with such unrest, Her aged Nourse, whose name was Glauce4 hight, Feeling her leape out of her loathed nest, Betwixt her feeble armes her quickly keight,5 And downe againe her in her warme bed dight; “Ah my deare daughter, ah my dearest dread,6 What uncouth7 fit” (sayd she) “what evill plight Hath thee opprest, and with sad drearyhead Chaunged thy lively cheare, and living made thee dead?8 31 “For not of nought these suddein ghastly feares All night afflict thy naturall repose, And all the day, when as thine equall peares, Their fit disports with faire delight doe chose, Thou in dull corners doest thy selfe inclose, Ne tastest Princes9 pleasures, ne doest spred 1

ward: guard. couch: bed; closely: privately. 3 still: distil. 4 Glauce: the name resembles the Greek words for “gray” and for “owl” (a bird emblematic of the warrior goddess Minerva). It is also one name for the goddess Diana’s mother. 5 keight: caught. 6 my dearest dread: this lovely phrase conveys Glauce’s competing feelings: she is in awe of Britomart, who is, after all, her mistress; but she also loves Britomart 2

protectively, fearing that harm might come to her. 7 uncouth: unknown, mysterious. 8 living made thee dead: made you, while yet living, look deathly. 9 Princes: those of rulers. A Prince could be either male or female; Queen Elizabeth was called a Prince. Glauce means that Britomart has not been availing herself of the privileged leisure and entertainments that are hers by right of her royal birth. Nonetheless, there is a hint of a double entendre: the idea that Britomart has not been

Canto Two

41

Abroad thy fresh youths fayrest flowre, but lose Both leafe and fruite, both too untimely shed, As one in wilfull bale1 for ever buried. 32 “The time,2 that mortall men their weary cares Do lay away, and all wilde beastes do rest, And every river eke his3 course forbeares, Then doth this wicked evill thee infest, And rive with thousand throbs thy thrilled4 brest; Like an huge Aetn’ 5 of deepe engulfed gryefe, Sorrow is heaped in thy hollow chest, Whence foorth it breakes in sighes and anguish ryfe, As smoke and sulphure mingled with confused stryfe. 33 “Ay me, how much I feare, least love it bee,6 But if that love it be, as sure I read By knowen signes and passions, which I see, Be it worthy of thy race7 and royall sead, Then I avow by this most sacred head Of my deare foster childe, to ease thy griefe, And win thy will: Therefore away doe8 dread; For death nor daunger from thy dew reliefe Shall me debarre; tell me therefore my liefest liefe.”9 34 So having sayd, her twixt her armes twaine Shee streightly straynd, and colled tenderly,10 And every trembling joynt, and every vaine Shee softly felt, and rubbed busily, To doe the frosen cold away to fly; And her faire deawy eies with kisses deare Shee ofte did bathe, and ofte againe did dry; And ever her importund, not to feare To let the secret of her hart to her appeare.

tasting the joys of disporting herself with male princes. 1 bale: torment; evil. 2 The time: i.e., nighttime. 3 his: its. 4 rive: cleave; thrilled: penetrated, pierced. 5 Aetn’: Aetna, volcano.

6 least: lest. Glauce gives no indication of thinking that love is wrong, but she knows that it causes pain. 7 race: lineage. 8 win thy will: help you achieve your desire; away doe: do away with. 9 liefest liefe: dearest dear. 10 I.e., tightly held and hugged tenderly.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

35 The Damzell pauzd, and then thus fearfully; “Ah Nurse, what needeth thee to eke1 my paine? Is not enough, that I alone doe dye, But it must doubled bee with death of twaine? For nought for me, but death there doth remaine.” “O daughter deare” (said she) “despeire no whit, For never sore, but might2 a salve obtaine: That blinded God, which hath ye blindly smit, Another arrow hath your lovers hart to hit.” 36 “But mine is not” (quoth she) “like others wownd; For which no reason can finde remedy.”3 “Was never such, but mote the like be fownd,”4 (Said she) “and though no reason may apply Salve to your sore, yet love can higher stye,5 Then reasons reach, and oft hath wonders donne.” “But neither God of love, nor God of skye Can doe” (said she) “that, which cannot be donne.” “Things ofte impossible” (quoth she) “seeme ere begonne.” 37 “These idle wordes” (said she) “doe nought aswage My stubborne smart, but more annoiaunce breed. For no no usuall fire, no usuall rage Yt is, O Nourse, which on my life doth feed, And sucks the blood, which from my hart doth bleed. But since thy faithfull zele lets me not hyde My crime, (if crime it be) I will it reed. Nor Prince, nor pere it is, whose love hath gryde6 My feeble brest of late, and launched7 this wound wyde. 38 “Nor man it is, nor other living wight; For then some hope I might unto me draw, But th’only shade8 and semblant of a knight, 1

eke: augment. never sore, but might: there is never a sore that cannot. 3 Unlike other people, she has fallen in love not with a person but with a mere image, so she believes herself unique in having a desire that is impossible to satisfy. In another sense, however, she is just like any love-smitten teenager, certain that no one 2

else in the history of the world has felt her degree of pain. 4 I.e., there has never existed a wound of this sort for which it is impossible to find a remedy. 5 stye: rise, surmount. 6 gryde: pierced. 7 launched: lanced. 8 shade: insubstantial image; spirit.

Canto Two

43

Whose shape1 or person yet I never saw, Hath me subjected to loves cruell law: The same one day, as me misfortune led, I in my fathers wondrous mirrhour saw, And pleased with that seeming goodly-hed,2 Unwares the hidden hooke with baite I swallowed. 39 “Sithens3 it hath infixed faster hold Within my bleeding bowells, and so sore Now ranckleth in this same fraile fleshly mould, That all mine entrailes flow with poisnous gore, And th’ulcer groweth daily more and more; Ne can my ronning sore finde remedee, Other then my hard fortune to deplore, And languish as the leafe faln from the tree, Till death make one end of my daies and miseree.” 40 “Daughter” (said she) “what4 need ye be dismayd, Or why make ye such Monster of your minde?5 Of much more uncouth6 thing I was affrayd; Of filthy lust, contrary unto kinde:7 But this affection nothing straunge I finde; For who with reason can you aye8 reprove, To love the semblaunt9 pleasing most your minde, And yield your heart, whence ye cannot remove? No guilt in you, but in the tyranny of love. 41 “Not so th’Arabian Myrrhe10 did sett her mynd, Nor so did Biblis spend her pining hart, 1

shape: i.e., appearance in person, rather than in a crystal ball. 2 goodly-hed: goodlihead, promising appearance. 3 Sithens: since then. 4 what: why, for what reason. 5 I.e., why do you conceive that your thoughts are monstrous? Cf. Britomart’s responding to Malecasta in Canto One as though Malecasta were a monster—or as though having anything to do with Malecasta would make Britomart herself into a monster.

6

uncouth: outlandish, inexplicable. contrary unto kinde: contrary to what is proper for a human being. 8 aye: ever. 9 semblaunt: appearance. 10 Glauce gives examples of women in Roman mythology whose desires were shameful: Myrrha committed incest with her father, Biblis desired her brother, and Pasiphaë had intercourse with a bull. Ovid’s account of Myrrha’s attempts to fight her incestuous desires and of her confiding in her nurse strongly resembles Spenser’s 7

44

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

But lov’d their native flesh against al kynd,1 And to their purpose used wicked art: Yet playd Pasiphaë a more monstrous part, That lov’d a Bul, and learnd a beast to bee; Such shamefull lusts who loaths not, which depart From course of nature and of modestee? Swete love such lewdnes bands from his faire companee. 42 “But thine my Deare (welfare thy heart2 my deare) Though straunge beginning had, yet fixed is On one, that worthy may perhaps appeare; And certes seemes bestowed not amis: Joy thereof have thou and eternall blis.” With that upleaning on her elbow weake, Her alablaster brest she soft did kis, Which all that while shee felt to pant and quake, As it an Earth-quake were, at last she thus bespake. 43 “Beldame,3 your words doe worke me litle ease; For though my love be not so lewdly bent,4 As those ye blame, yet may it nought appease My raging smart, ne ought5 my flame relent, But rather doth my helpelesse griefe augment. For they, how ever shamefull and unkinde, Yet did possesse their horrible intent: Short end of sorowes they therby did finde; So was their fortune good, though wicked were their minde.6 44 “But wicked fortune mine, though minde be good, Can have no end,7 nor hope of my desire, But feed on shadowes, whiles I die for food, account in this canto, except that Britomart’s desires turn out to be far less shameful than her nurse had feared, whereas the reverse is true in Myrrha’s case (Metamorphoses, 10.298–501). 1 native flesh: members of their own families; against al kynd: unnaturally for humankind. 2 welfare thy heart: may your heart be well. 3 Beldame: elderly woman, literally “grandmother.”

4

lewdly bent: wickedly inclined. ought: at all. 6 Despite being a paragon of chastity, Britomart is still youthful enough for self-centered melodrama: ignoring the weighty moral component of Glauce’s advice, Britomart responds petulantly, “Well, at least those women who committed incest and bestiality got what they wanted, so they were luckier than I am.” 7 end: goal; ending. 5

Canto Two

45

And like a shadow wexe,1 whiles with entire Affection, I doe languish and expire. I fonder, then Cephisus foolish chyld,2 Who having vewed in a fountaine shere His face, was with the love thereof beguyld; I fonder love a shade, the body far exyld.” 45 “Nought like”3 (quoth shee) “for that same wretched boy Was of him selfe the ydle Paramoure; Both love and lover, without hope of joy, For which he faded to a watry flowre. But better fortune thine, and better howre,4 Which lov’st the shadow5 of a warlike knight; No shadow, but a body hath in powre: That body, wheresoever that it light, May learned be by cyphres, or by Magicke might.6 46 “But if thou may with reason yet represse The growing evill, ere it strength have gott, And thee abandond wholy doe possesse, Against it strongly strive,7 and yield thee nott, Til thou in open fielde adowne be smott.8 But if the passion mayster thy fraile might, So that needs9 love or death must bee thy lott, Then I avow to thee, by wrong or right To compas10 thy desire, and find that loved knight.” 47 Her chearefull words much cheard the feeble spright Of the sicke virgin, that her downe she layd In her warme bed to sleepe, if that she might;

1

6 I.e., no matter where that knight’s body is,

2

signs or magic will show us its location. 7 I.e., but if, before your desire grows strong enough to possess you utterly, you are able to use the power of reason to repress it, do struggle against it. 8 open fielde: field of battle; smott: smitten. 9 needs: necessarily. 10 compas: achieve; embrace; work machinations for; understand.

wexe: grow, become. fonder: more foolish; chyld: Narcissus, a mythological boy who fell in love with his own reflection in a pool and pined away gazing at it, ultimately turning into the narcissus flower. 3 Nought like: i.e., you are nothing like him. 4 howre: hour, time. 5 shadow: insubstantial image; reflection.

46

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

And the old-woman carefully displayd The clothes about her round with busy ayd, So that at last a litle creeping sleepe Surprisd her sence: Shee therewith well apayd, The dronken1 lamp down in the oyl did steepe, And sett her by to watch, and sett her by to weepe.2 48 Earely the morrow next, before that day His joyous face did to the world revele, They both uprose, and tooke their ready way Unto the Church, their praiers to appele,3 With great devotion, and with litle zele: For the faire Damzell from the holy herse4 Her love-sicke hart to other thoughts did steale; And that old Dame said many an idle verse, Out of her daughters hart fond fancies to reverse.5 49 Retourned home, the royall Infant6 fell Into her former fitt; for why7 no powre, Nor guidaunce of her selfe in her did dwell.8 But th’aged Nourse her calling to her bowre, Had gathered Rew, and Savine,9 and the flowre Of Camphora, and Calamint, and Dill, All which she in a earthen Pot did poure, And to the brim with Colt wood did it fill, And many drops of milk and blood through it did spill.

1 dronken: i.e., drunk with lamp oil. This is not precisely a transferred epithet, given that Glauce is not drunk, but she is indeed feeling overwhelmed by a flood of cares. 2 Glauce is saddened that her foster daughter is now old enough to feel pain in love. The nurse’s anxious ministrations also suggest a sadness arising from no longer being able to understand or govern Britomart fully. 3 appele: appeal. 4 herse: liturgy. 5 I.e., in order to purge her daughter’s heart of foolish fancies.

6

Infant: youth of noble birth. for why: because. 8 Cf. the slightly older Britomart’s declaration to Malecasta’s knights: “Ne may love be compeld by maistery; / For soone as maistery comes, sweet love anone / Taketh his nimble winges, and soone away is gone” (i.25). 9 Rew, and Savine: these, along with camphor, mint, dill, and colt wood, are herbs used to soothe the intestines, purge bad humors, and stanch bleeding. They were regarded as especially useful in abating lust and preventing pregnancy. 7

Canto Two

47

50 Then taking thrise three heares from off her head, Them trebly breaded in a threefold lace, And round about the Pots mouth, bound the thread,1 And after having whispered a space Certein sad2 words, with hollow voice and bace, Shee to the virgin sayd, thrise sayd she itt; “Come daughter come, come; spit upon my face, Spitt thrise upon me, thrise upon me spitt; Th’uneven nomber for this busines is most fitt.”3 51 That sayd, her rownd about she from her turnd, She turned her contrary to the Sunne, Thrise she her turnd contrary, and returnd, All contrary; for she the right did shunne, And ever what she did, was streight undonne. So thought she to undoe her daughters love: But love, that is in gentle brest begonne, No ydle charmes so lightly may remove, That well can witnesse, who by tryall it does prove.4 52 Ne ought5 it mote the noble Mayd avayle, Ne slake the fury of her cruell flame, But that shee still did waste, and still did wayle, That through long languour, and hart-burning brame6 She shortly like a pyned ghost became, Which long hath waited by the Stygian strond.7 That when old Glauce saw, for feare least8 blame Of her miscarriage should in her be fond,9 She wist not how t’amend, nor how it10 to withstond. 1

Glauce is practicing magic. sad: solemn. 3 We must ask ourselves whether the poem is asking us to be touched at Glauce’s earnest efforts or whether it is asking us to find those efforts amusing. Certainly Glauce’s magic does not seem evil, but its mystery is less powerful than that of love itself. 4 prove: test. 5 ought: aught, at all. 6 brame: longing. 7 Stygian strond: the shores of the river Styx. In Greek and Roman mythology, 2

spirits of the dead waited by this river longingly until allowed to cross over into the underworld. 8 least: lest. 9 miscarriage: ill management; fond: found. 10 The reference of “it” broadens further the longer one looks at it: Britomart’s desire, the effects of Britomart’s desire, the whole future that opens up because of Britomart’s desire, the condition of the desiring human race.

Canto Three Merlin bewrayes1 to Britomart, The state of Arthegall. And shews the famous Progeny Which from them springen shall.

1

Most sacred fyre, that burnest mightily In living brests, ykindled first above, Emongst th’eternall spheres and lamping2 sky, And thence3 pourd into men, which men call Love; Not that same, which doth base affections4 move In brutish mindes, and filthy lust inflame, But that sweete fit, that doth true beautie love, And choseth vertue for his dearest Dame, Whence spring all noble deedes and never dying fame:

2

Well did Antiquity a God thee deeme, That over mortall mindes hast so great might, To order them, as best to thee doth seeme, And all their actions to direct aright; The fatall5 purpose of divine foresight, Thou doest effect in destined descents,6 Through deepe impression of thy secret might, And stirredst up th’Heroes high intents, Which the late world admyres for wondrous moniments.7

3

But thy dredd dartes in none doe triumph more, Ne braver8 proofe in any, of thy powre Shew’dst thou, then in this royall Maid of yore, Making her seeke an unknowne Paramoure, From the worlds end, through many a bitter stowre:

1

6

bewrayes: reveals. lamping: flashing, resplendent. One of Spenser’s neologisms. 3 thence: from there. 4 affections: emotions; passions. 5 fatall: determined by fate.

destined descents: lines of progeny determined by destiny. 7 late: old; advanced; tardy; recent; moniments: marks of Love’s power and/or evidence of the heroes’ virtues. 8 braver: more splendid; worthier.

2

48

Canto Three

49

From whose two loynes1 thou afterwardes did rayse Most famous fruites of matrimoniall bowre, Which through the earth have spredd their living prayse, That fame in tromp2 of gold eternally displayes. 4

Begin then, O my dearest sacred Dame, Daughter of Phœbus and of Memorye,3 That doest ennoble with immortall name The warlike Worthies,4 from antiquitye, In thy great volume of Eternitye: Begin, O Clio, and recount from hence My glorious Soveraines goodly auncestrye, Till that by dew degrees and long protense,5 Thou have it lastly brought unto her Excellence.

5

Full many wayes within her troubled mind, Old Glauce cast, to cure this Ladies griefe: Full many waies she sought, but none could find, Nor herbes, nor6 charmes, nor counsel that is chiefe, And choisest med’cine for sick harts reliefe: For thy great care she tooke, and greater feare, Least that it should her turne to fowle repriefe,7 And sore reproch, when so her father deare Should of his dearest daughters hard misfortune heare.8

6

At last she her avisde,9 that he, which made That mirrhour, wherein the sicke Damosell So straungely vewed her straunge10 lovers shade,

1

loynes: loins. tromp: trumpet. Cf. Spenser’s metaphorizing his poem as “trumpets sterne” in I.Pr.1. 3 The speaker calls upon his muse to help him write poetry. Clio, one of the nine muses, is the daughter of Apollo (Phoebus) and Mnemosyne (Memory). 2

4

Worthies: the Nine Worthies were nine men—three pagans, three Jews, and three Christians—famed for their deeds throughout history. The precise list of names varies according to source.

5

dew degrees: legitimate steps. Elizabeth’s father, Henry VIII, had declared her a bas-

tard in her youth, so it was important for her to establish legitimacy as an adult; protense: duration. 6 Nor . . . nor: neither . . . nor. 7 Least: lest; repriefe: reproof. 8 For all that he is mentioned, Britomart’s father never makes an appearance in the poem. Spenser gives Britomart legitimacy through her own virtues, through her identification as Elizabeth’s ancestor, and through her resemblance to the goddess Minerva as much as through her ties to various Welsh and English kings. 9 avisde: recalled. 10 straunge: unknown, foreign.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

To weet,1 the learned Merlin, well could tell, Under what coast2 of heaven the man did dwell, And by what means his love might best be wrought: For though beyond the Africk Ismael,3 Or th’Indian Peru he were, she thought Him forth through infinite endevour to have sought. 7

Forthwith them selves disguising both in straunge And base atyre, that none might them bewray, To Maridunum, that is now by chaunge Of name Cayr-Merdin4 cald, they tooke their way: There the wise Merlin whylome wont (they5 say) To make his wonne,6 low underneath the ground, In a deepe delve,7 farre from the vew of day, That of no living wight he mote be found, When so he counseld with his sprights encompast round.

8

And if thou ever happen that same way To traveill, go to see that dreadfull place: It is an hideous hollow cave (they say) Under a Rock that lyes a litle space From the swift Barry,8 tombling downe apace, Emongst the woody hilles of Dynevowre:9 But dare thou not, I charge, in any cace, To enter into that same balefull Bowre, For fear the cruell Feendes should thee unwares devowre.

9

But standing high aloft, low lay thine eare, And there such ghastly noyse of yron chaines, And brasen10 Caudrons thou shalt rombling heare, Which thousand sprights with long enduring paines Doe tosse, that it will stonn thy feeble braines, And oftentimes great grones, and grievous stownds,

1

To weet: to wit, that is. coast: region. 3 Africk Ismael: northern Africa, whose inhabitants were thought to have descended from Ishmael. 4 Cayr-Merdin: Carmarthen in Wales. 2

5

they: in this canto, Spenser makes extensive use of chronicles written by Geoffrey

of Monmouth and by Holinshed, among others, as well as of Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur. 6 wonne: dwelling. 7 delve: excavated cave. 8 Barry: the river Cadoxton in Wales. 9 Dynevowre: Dynevor Castle. 10 brasen: brass.

Canto Three

51

When too huge toile and labour them constraines: And oftentimes loud strokes, and ringing sowndes From under that deepe Rock most horribly rebowndes. 10

The cause some say is this: A litle whyle Before that Merlin dyde, he did intend, A brasen wall in compas to compyle About Cairmardin, and did it commend Unto these Sprights, to bring to perfect end.1 During which worke the Lady of the Lake, Whom long he lov’d, for him in hast did send, Who thereby forst his workemen to forsake, Them bownd till his retourne, their labour not to slake.

11

In the meane time through that false Ladies traine,2 He was surprisd, and buried under beare,3 Ne ever to his worke returnd againe: Nath’lesse those feends may not their work forbeare, So greatly his commandement they feare, But there doe toyle and traveile day and night, Untill that brasen wall they up doe reare: For Merlin had in Magick more insight, Then ever him before or after living wight.

12

For he by wordes could call out of the sky Both Sunne and Moone, and make them him obay: The Land to sea, and sea to maineland dry, And darksom night he eke could turne to day: Huge hostes of men he could alone4 dismay, And hostes of men of meanest thinges could frame,5 When so him list his enimies to fray:6 That to this day for terror of his fame, The feends do quake, when any him to them does name.

13

And sooth, men say that he was not the sonne Of mortall Syre, or other living wight, But wondrously begotten, and begonne

1

end: fulfillment, completion. traine: wiles, machinations. 3 beare: bier. 4 alone: single-handedly. 2

5

meanest: most ignoble; basest; frame: form. Merlin conjures armies out of everyday materials. 6 fray: frighten.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

By false illusion of a guilefull Spright, On a faire Ladie Nonne,1 that whilome hight Matilda, daughter to Pubidius, Who was the Lord of Mathraval 2 by right, And coosen unto king Ambrosius: Whence he indued was with skill so marveilous. 14

They here ariving, staid a while without, Ne durst adventure rashly in to wend, But of their first intent gan make new dout For dread of daunger, which it might portend: Untill the hardy Mayd (with love to frend3) First entering, the dreadfull Mage4 there fownd Deepe busied bout worke of wondrous end, And writing straunge characters5 in the grownd, With which the stubborne6 feendes he to his service bownd.

15

He nought was moved at their entraunce bold: For of their comming well he wist afore, Yet list7 them bid their businesse to unfold, As if ought in this world in secrete store Were from him hidden, or unknowne of yore. Then Glauce thus, “Let not it thee offend, That we thus rashly through thy darksom dore, Unwares have prest: for either fatall end,8 Or other mightie cause us two did hether send.”

16

He bad9 tell on; And then she thus began. “Now have three Moones with borrowd brothers light, Thrise shined faire, and thrise seemd dim and wan, Sith a sore evill, which this virgin bright Tormenteth, and doth plonge in dolefull plight, First rooting tooke; but what thing it mote bee, Or whence it sprong, I can not read aright: But this I read, that but if 10 remedee, Thou her afford, full shortly I her dead shall see.”

1

6

2

7

Nonne: nun. Mathraval: the seat of the Welsh kings of Powys. 3 to frend: as a friend. 4 Mage: magician, sorcerer. 5 characters: letters.

stubborne: difficult to tame. list: desired, requested. 8 fatall end: goal determined by fate. 9 bad: bade her. 10 but if: unless.

Canto Three

17

Therewith th’Enchaunter softly gan to smyle At her smooth speeches, weeting inly1 well, That she to him dissembled womanish guyle, And to her said, Beldame, by that2 ye tell, More neede of leach-crafte3 hath your Damozell, Then of my skill: who helpe may have elswhere, In vaine seekes wonders out of Magick spell.” Th’old woman wox4 half blanck, those words to heare; And yet was loth to let her purpose plaine appeare.

18

And to him said, “Yf any leaches skill, Or other learned meanes could have redrest This my deare daughters deepe engraffed5 ill, Certes6 I should be loth thee to molest: But this sad evill, which doth her infest, Doth course of naturall cause farre exceed, And housed is within her hollow brest, That either seemes some cursed witches deed, Or evill spright, that in her doth such torment breed.”

19

The wisard could no lenger beare her bord,7 But brusting forth in laughter, to her sayd; “Glauce, what needes this colourable8 word, To cloke the cause, that hath it selfe bewrayd? Ne ye fayre Britomartis, thus arayd, More hidden are, then Sunne in cloudy vele; Whom thy good fortune, having fate obayd, Hath hether brought, for succour to appele: The which the powres to thee are pleased to revele.”

20

The doubtfull9 Mayd, seeing her selfe descryde, Was all abasht, and her pure yvory10 Into a cleare Carnation suddeine dyde; As fayre Aurora rysing hastily,

1

4

2

5

inly: inwardly. Beldame: elderly woman, “grandmother”; by that: according to that which. 3 leach-crafte: skill of a physician. (Physicians used leeches to draw blood, in order to bring patients’ humors back into balance.)

wox: waxed, grew. engraffed: engrafted. 6 Certes: certainly. 7 bord: bourd, nonsense, silly story. 8 colourable: specious. 9 doubtfull: full of doubt; hesitating. 10 yvory: i.e., complexion.

53

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

Doth by her blushing tell, that she did lye All night in old Tithonus frosen bed,1 Whereof she seemes ashamed inwardly. But her olde Nourse was nought dishartened, But vauntage made of that, which Merlin had ared.2 21

And sayd, “Sith then thou knowest all our griefe, (For what doest not thou knowe?) of grace I pray, Pitty our playnt, and yield us meet reliefe.” With that the Prophet still awhile did stay,3 And then his spirite thus gan foorth display; “Most noble Virgin, that by fatall lore Hast learn’d to love, let no whit thee dismay The hard beginne, that meetes thee in the dore, And with sharpe fits thy tender hart oppresseth sore.

22

“For so must all things excellent begin, And eke enrooted deepe must be that Tree, Whose big embodied braunches shall not lin,4 Till they to hevens hight forth stretched bee. For from thy wombe a famous Progenee Shall spring, out of the auncient Trojan blood,5 Which shall revive the sleeping memoree Of those same antique Peres,6 the hevens brood, Which Greeke and Asian rivers stayned with their blood.

23

“Renowmed kings, and sacred Emperours, Thy fruitfull Ofspring, shall from thee descend; Brave Captaines, and most mighty warriours,

1

Tithonus frosen bed: in Greek and Roman mythology, Aurora (the Dawn, Eos) loved a mortal man, Tithonus. She begged Zeus to make her lover immortal, which wish he granted; but because she had forgotten to ask that he remain young, Tithonus grew continuously older. 2 vauntage: advantage; ared: interpreted; discerned, saw; understood; predicted; guessed; named; declared; taught; advised; decreed. 3 stay: wait.

4

embodied: laden with, or composed of, bodies; lin: cease. 5 Trojan blood: partly because of the ancient Roman occupation of Britain, the English of Spenser’s day believed their ancestry traced back to Aeneas, a Trojan prince who left Troy as it burned and went on to found the Roman race. According to Geoffrey of Monmouth, Aeneas’s greatgrandson Brute traveled to Britain and founded Troynovant, or London. See ix.34.9.n. 6 Peres: Homeric heroes.

Canto Three

55

That shall their conquests through all lands extend, And their decayed kingdomes shall amend: The feeble Britons, broken with long warre, They shall upreare, and mightily defend Against their forren foe, that commes from farre, Till universall peace compound all civill jarre.1 24

“It was not, Britomart, thy wandring eye, Glauncing unwares in charmed looking glas, But the streight2 course of hevenly destiny, Led with eternall providence, that has Guyded thy glaunce, to bring his will to pas: Ne is thy fate, ne is thy fortune ill, To love the prowest3 knight, that ever was. Therefore submit thy wayes unto his will, And doe by all dew meanes thy destiny fulfill.”

25

“But read” (said Glauce) “thou Magitian What meanes shall she out seeke, or what waies take? How shall she know, how shall she finde the man? Or what needes her to toyle, sith fates can make Way for themselves, their purpose to pertake?”4 Then Merlin thus, “Indeede the fates are firme, And may not shrinck, though all the world do shake: Yet ought mens good endevours them confirme, And guyde the heavenly causes to their constant terme.5

26

“The man whom heavens have ordaynd to bee The spouse of Britomart, is Arthegall: 6

1

jarre: strife. streight: strait, confined, strict. In contrast, compare this book’s images of wandering and erring. 3 prowest: most worthy, most valiant. 2

4

pertake: partake, obtain. constant terme: fixed conclusion. 6 Merlin’s prophecy is the second of three recountings of Britain’s history in The Faerie Queene, although the three parts are not presented in chronological order. Twothirds of the way through Book Three, 5

Paridell’s account of his family’s history will begin at the beginning, with Paris’ rape of Helen, which led to the Trojan War (III.ix.33–52). In Book Two, Sir Guyon found a book that told the history of Britain from the arrival of Brute, a legendary descendant of the Trojans who fled the fallen city, to the rule of Arthur’s father (II.ix.60–x.77). In the present canto, Merlin tells Britomart the final installment when he predicts the future of her and Artegall’s descendants. By having Merlin utter this prophesy, Spenser is actually recounting the past: Merlin’s prophecy will end with

56

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

He wonneth in the land of Fayeree,1 Yet is no Fary borne, ne sib2 at all To Elfes,3 but sprong of seed terrestriall, And whylome by false Faries stolne away, Whyles yet in infant cradle he did crall;4 Ne other5 to himselfe is knowne this day, But that he by an Elfe was gotten6 of a Fay. 27

“But sooth he is the sonne of Gorlois,7 And brother unto Cador Cornish king, And for his warlike feates renowmed is, From where the day out of the sea doth spring, Untill the closure of the Evening. From thence, him firmely bound with faithfull band,8 To this his native soyle thou backe shalt bring, Strongly to ayde his countrey, to withstand The powre of forreine Paynims,9 which invade thy land.

28

“Great ayd thereto his mighty puissaunce,10 And dreaded name shall give in that sad day: Where also proofe of thy prow11 valiaunce Thou then shalt make, t’increase thy lovers pray.12

Elizabeth’s rule, depicted by Merlin as the glorious culmination of one thousand years of hope and struggle after Britomart’s and Artegall’s deaths. For all three histories, Spenser relies heavily upon the most respected chronicles of his day: Geoffrey of Monmouth, John Hardyng, John Stow, and Raphael Holinshed. 1 Fayeree: see Introduction, 2. 2 sib: sibling. 3 Elfes: faeries. 4 crall: crawl. 5 Ne other: i.e., no other version of his past. 6 gotten: begotten. 7 sooth: truly; Gorlois: Prince of Cornwall, whose wife, Igerne, slept with Uther Pendragon and as a result gave birth to Arthur. Spenser thus implicitly makes Artegall the stepbrother of Arthur. If the 25

stanzas that name the generations sometimes seem wearisome to modern readers, we would do well to remember that in the sixteenth century—and indeed, up through the nineteenth—whenever one met or heard of a stranger, the first thing one wanted to know was who that person’s parents and grandparents were. Merlin’s prophecy gives information about the boy who has, so to speak, shown up to take Glauce’s daughter on a date—but it is also proof of national identity, and it grounds that identity in the Tudor bloodline. 8 thence: Faerie Land; faithfull band: bond of matrimony. 9 Paynims: pagans (the Saxon invaders of Britain). 10 puissaunce: strength. 11 proofe: test, experience; prow: worthy. 12 pray: prey.

Canto Three

57

Long time ye both in armes shall beare great sway, Till thy wombes burden thee from them do call, And his last fate him from thee take away, Too rathe1 cut off by practise criminall, Of secrete foes, that him shall make in mischiefe fall. 29

“With thee yet shall he leave for memory Of his late puissaunce, his ymage dead,2 That living him in all activity To thee shall represent. He3 from the head Of his coosen Constantius without dread Shall take the crowne, that was his fathers right, And therewith crowne himselfe in th’others stead: Then shall he issew forth with dreadfull might, Against his Saxon foes in bloody field to fight.

30

“Like as a Lyon, that in drowsie cave Hath long time slept, himselfe so shall he shake, And comming forth, shall spred his banner brave Over the troubled South, that it shall make The warlike Mertians 4 for feare to quake: Thrise shall he fight with them, and twise shall win, But the third time shall fayre accordaunce5 make: And if he then with victorie can lin,6 He shall his dayes with peace bring to his earthly In.7

31

“His sonne, hight Vortipore, shall him succeede In kingdome, but not in felicity;8 Yet shall he long time warre with happy speed,9 And with great honour many batteills try:

1

rathe: quickly, soon. his ymage dead: the picture of a live Artegall after his death. This image of Artegall is his son; children were thought of as pictures of their parents. Spenser does not name the son, although the chroniclers gave his name as Conan. 3 To thee shall represent: i.e., who will represent Artegall to you as he was when he was alive and active; He: Artegall’s son. 2

4 Mertians: inhabitants of Mercia, an Anglo-Saxon kingdom in south-central England. 5 accordaunce: treaty. 6 lin: leave it at that. 7 In: inn, abode. 8 Stanzas 31 through 50 recount essentially what every student learned about England’s history, from the chroniclers Geoffrey of Monmouth and Holinshed. 9 speed: success.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

But at the last to th’importunity1 Of froward2 fortune shall be forst to yield. But his sonne Malgo shall full mightily Avenge his fathers losse, with speare and shield, And his proud foes discomfit in victorious field. 32

“Behold the man,3 and tell me Britomart, If ay4 more goodly creature thou didst see; How like a Gyaunt in each manly part Beares he himselfe with portly majestee, That one of th’old Heroes seemes to bee: He the six Islands, comprovinciall5 In auncient times unto great Britainee, Shall to the same reduce,6 and to him call Their sondry kings to doe their homage severall.7

33

“All which his sonne Careticus awhile Shall well defend, and Saxons powre suppresse, Untill a straunger king from unknowne soyle Arriving, him with multitude oppresse; Great Gormond, having with huge mightinesse Ireland subdewd, and therein fixt his throne, Like a swift Otter, fell through emptinesse,8 Shall overswim the sea with many one Of his Norveyses, to assist the Britons fone.9

34

“He in his furie all shall overronne, And holy Church with faithlesse handes deface, That thy sad people utterly fordonne, Shall to the utmost mountaines fly apace:

1

importunity: demands. froward: adverse; uncooperative; inimical. 3 Behold the man: we are not told whether Merlin is conjuring pictures in the air or whether he depends solely upon the magic of words to bring his subjects before Britomart’s mind’s eye. 4 ay: ever. 2

5

six Islands: Ireland, Iceland, Gothland, the Orkneys, Norway, and Denmark, which were said by the chroniclers to have become British possessions in this early period; comprovinciall: of the same province. 6 reduce: subdue. 7 severall: each, individually. 8 fell through emptinesse: cruel because of hunger. 9 Norveyses: Norwegians; fone: foes.

Canto Three

59

Was never so great waste in any place, Nor so fowle outrage doen by living men: For all thy Citties they shall sacke and race,1 And the greene grasse, that groweth, they shall bren,2 That even the wilde beast shall dy in starved den.3 35

“Whiles thus thy Britons doe in languour pine, Proud Etheldred shall from the North arise, Serving th’ambitious will of Augustine,4 And passing Dee5 with hardy enterprise, Shall backe repulse the valiaunt Brockwell twise, And Bangor with massacred Martyrs fill; But the third time shall rew his foolhardise: For Cadwan pittying his peoples ill, Shall stoutly him defeat, and thousand Saxons kill.

36

“But after him, Cadwallin6 mightily On his7 sonne Edwin all those wrongs shall wreake; Ne shall availe the wicked sorcery Of false Pellite, his purposes to breake, But him shall slay, and on a gallowes bleak Shall give th’enchaunter his unhappy hire:8 Then shall the Britons, late dismayd and weake, From their long vassallage gin to respire, And on their Paynim foes avenge their ranckled ire.

37

“Ne shall he yet his wrath so mitigate, Till both the sonnes of Edwin he have slayne, Offricke and Osricke, twinnes unfortunate, Both slaine in battaile upon Layburne playne, Together with the king of Louthiane,9 Hight Adin, and the king of Orkeny,

1

race: raze. bren: burn. 3 in starved den: a transferred epithet here meaning either “starved in its den” or “dead in its den.” 4 Augustine: not the theologian of the same name, but the first Archbishop of 2

Canterbury, sent by the pope to convert the Anglo-Saxons to Catholicism. 5 Dee: river in northern Wales and western England. 6

Cadwallin: Cadwan’s son. his: Ethelred’s. 8 hire: deserts. 9 Louthiane: Scotland. 7

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Both joynt partakers of their fatall payne: But Penda, fearefull of like desteny, Shall yield him selfe his liegeman, and sweare fealty. 38

“Him shall he make his fatall Instrument, T’afflict the other Saxons unsubdewd; He marching forth with fury insolent Against the good king Oswald, who indewd With heavenly powre, and by Angels reskewd, Al holding crosses in their hands on hye, Shall him defeate withouten blood imbrewd:1 Of which, that field for endlesse memory, Shall Hevenfield be cald to all posterity.

39

“Whereat Cadwallin wroth, shall forth issew, And an huge hoste into Northumber lead, With which he godly Oswald shall subdew, And crowne with martiredome his sacred head. Whose brother Oswin, daunted with like dread, With price of silver shall his kingdome buy, And Penda seeking him adowne to tread, Shall tread adowne, and doe him fowly dye,2 But shall with guifts his Lord Cadwallin pacify.

40

“Then shall Cadwallin die, and then the raine Of Britons eke with him attonce shall dye; Ne shall the good Cadwallader 3 with paine, Or powre, be hable4 it to remedy, When the full time prefixt by destiny, Shalbe expird of Britons regiment.5 For heven it selfe shall their successe envy, And them with plagues and murrins6 pestilent Consume, till all their warlike puissaunce be spent.

41

“Yet after all these sorrowes, and huge hills Of dying people, during eight yeares space, Cadwallader not yielding to his ills,

1

3

2

4

imbrewd: having stained their hands. I.e., and Penda, seeking to tread Oswin down, will be himself tread down by Oswin, who will hideously kill him.

Cadwallader: Cadwallin’s son. hable: able. 5 regiment: rule. 6 murrins: plagues.

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From Armoricke,1 where long in wretched cace He liv’d, retourning to his native place, Shalbe by vision staide from his intent: For th’heavens have decreed, to displace The Britons, for their sinnes dew punishment, And to the Saxons over-give their government. 42

“Then woe, and woe, and everlasting woe, Be to the Briton babe, that shalbe borne, To live in thraldome of his fathers foe; Late2 king, now captive, late lord, now forlorne, The worlds reproch, the cruell victors scorne, Banisht from princely bowre to wasteful3 wood: O who shal helpe me to lament, and mourne The royall seed, the antique Trojan blood, Whose empire lenger here, then ever any stood.”

43

The Damzell4 was full deepe empassioned, Both for his griefe, and for her peoples sake, Whose future woes so plaine he fashioned,5 And sighing sore, at length him thus bespake; “Ah but will hevens fury never slake, Nor vengeaunce huge relent it selfe at last? Will not long misery late mercy make, But shall their name for ever be defaste, And quite from off the earth their memory be raste?”6

44

“Nay but the terme” (sayd he) “is limited, That in this thraldome Britons shall abide, And the just revolution7 measured, That they as Straungers shalbe notifide.8 For twise fowre hundreth yeares shalbe supplide,9 Ere they unto their former rule restor’d shalbee,10

1

7

2

8

Armoricke: Brittany. Late: lately, recently. 3 wasteful: deserted, wild. 4 Damzell: Britomart. 5 fashioned: described. 6 raste: erased.

just revolution: full cycle. Straungers: figuratively, wanderers in their own land; notifide: denoted. 9 supplide: completed. 10 I.e., when the first Tudor, Henry VII, ascends the English throne in 1485.

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And their importune1 fates all satisfide: Yet during this their most obscuritee, Their beames shall oft breake forth, that men then faire may see. 45

“For Rhodoricke, whose surname shalbe Great, Shall of him selfe a brave ensample shew, That Saxon kings his frendship shall intreat; And Howell Dha shall goodly well indew The salvage minds with skill of just and trew;2 Then Griffyth Conan also shall up reare His dreaded head, and the old sparkes renew Of native corage, that his foes shall feare, Least back againe the kingdom he from them should beare.

46

“Ne shall the Saxons selves all peaceably Enjoy the crowne, which they from Britons wonne First ill,3 and after ruled wickedly: For ere two hundred yeares be full outronne, There shall a Raven4 far from rising Sunne, With his wide wings upon them fiercely fly, And bid his faithlesse chickens overonne The fruitfull plaines, and with fell cruelty, In their avenge, tread downe the victors surquedry.5

47

“Yet shall a third both these, and thine subdew; There shall a Lion from the sea-bord wood Of Neustria come roring, with a crew6 Of hungry whelpes, his battailous bold brood, Whose clawes were newly dipt in cruddy7 blood, That from the Daniske Tyrants head shall rend Th’usurped crowne, as if that he were wood,8 And the spoile9 of the countrey conquered Emongst his young ones shall divide with bountyhed.

1

importune: burdensome, severe. salvage: savage, brutish; wild; skill of just and trew: knowledge of justice and truth. 3 ill: badly. 4 Raven: the Danish standard depicted a Raven. 2

5

surquedry: arrogance. Neustria: Normandy, the realm of William the Conqueror; crew: bunch; gang; mob; group. 7 cruddy: curdled. 8 wood: insane (with lust for war). 9 spoile: booty. 6

Canto Three

48

“Tho when the terme is full accomplishid, There shall a sparke of fire, which hath long-while Bene in his ashes raked up, and hid, Bee freshly kindled in the fruitfull Ile Of Mona,1 where it lurked in exile; Which shall breake forth into bright burning flame, And reach into the house, that beares the stile2 Of roiall majesty and soveraine name; So shall the Briton blood their crowne agayn reclame.

49

“Thenceforth eternall union shall be made Betweene the nations different afore, And sacred Peace shall lovingly persuade The warlike minds, to learne her goodly lore, And civile armes3 to exercise no more: Then shall a royall Virgin4 raine, which shall Stretch her white rod over the Belgicke5 shore, And the great Castle smite so sore with all,6 That it shall make him shake, and shortly learn to fall.

50

“But yet the end is not.”7 There Merlin stayd, As overcomen of the spirites powre, Or other ghastly spectacle dismayd,

1

Mona: Anglesey, an island off the coast of Wales, where Henry VII was born. 2 stile: title. 3 civile armes: arms used in civil war or in disputes between the civilians of England and of Wales. 4 Elizabeth Tudor, the Virgin Queen. 5 Belgicke: Belgian. Spenser uses the name to refer collectively to the Low Countries, including the Netherlands and Belgium, which had harbors that provided dangerously easy access to England. Spain had controlled the Low Countries for decades, making Elizabeth nervous. Yet there were Dutch Protestants who started a rebellion against Spain’s Catholic rule. After years of ambiguously supporting the Dutch rebels, Elizabeth finally sent in an army in 1585. Relations with Spain worsened to the point

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at which Spain attempted to invade England in 1588. Although the Spanish Armada was defeated primarily by a storm, rather than by direct battle, the English victory cemented Elizabeth’s power in her own country. She had proven herself a warlike maid, a virgin in armor. 6 sore: violently; with all: therewith (OED 2). 7 But yet the end is not: but the end (of this story) has not yet been told—or has not yet occurred. The phrase negotiates between Merlin’s position—living before these events have occurred, while nevertheless being able to predict most of them— and Spenser’s position—living after these events have occurred, but hopeful of even more glorious things to come in Elizabeth’s reign. Merlin’s words also echo those of Jesus to the disciples in Matt. 24.6.

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That secretly he saw, yet note1 discovre: Which suddein fitt, and halfe extatick stoure2 When the two fearefull wemen saw, they grew Greatly confused in behaveoure; At last the fury past, to former hew3 Hee turnd againe, and chearfull looks did shew. 51

Then, when them selves they well instructed had Of all, that needed them to be inquird,4 They both conceiving hope of comfort glad, With lighter hearts unto their home retird; Where they in secret counsell close conspird, How to effect so hard an enterprize, And to possesse the purpose they desird: Now this, now that twixt them they did devize, And diverse plots did frame, to maske in strange disguise.

52

At last the Nourse in her foolhardy wit Conceivd a bold devise,5 and thus bespake; “Daughter, I deeme that counsel aye most fit, That of the time doth dew advauntage take; Ye see that good king Uther now doth make Strong warre upon the Paynim brethren, hight Octa and Oza, whom he lately brake Beside Cayr Verolame,6 in victorious fight, That now all Britany doth burne in armes bright.

53

“That therefore nought our passage may empeach,7 Let us in feigned armes our selves disguize, And our weake hands (need makes good schollers) teach The dreadful speare and shield to exercize: Ne certes daughter that same warlike wize I weene, would you misseeme;8 for ye beene tall,

1 2

note: did not.

extatick stoure: visionary trance. The implication is that Merlin sees something either so wonderful or so horrifying that he cannot relate it to Britomart and Glauce. Spenser, of course, does not know what will happen next. 3 hew: appearance; condition. 4 I.e., about everything they needed to ask.

5 6

devise: device, clever plan.

Cayr Verolame: St. Albans, a town north of London. Uther fought the Jutes Octa and Oza around the time when Arthur first appears in the chronicles. 7 empeach: impede. 8 you misseeme: misbecome you, seem inappropriate on you.

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65

And large of limbe, t’atchieve an hard emprize,1 Ne ought ye want, but skil, which practize small Wil bring, and shortly make you a mayd Martiall. 54

“And sooth, it ought your corage much inflame, To heare so often, in that royall hous, From whence to none inferior ye came: Bards tell of many wemen valorous, Which have full many feats adventurous, Performd, in paragone2 of proudest men: The bold Bunduca,3 whose victorious Exployts made Rome to quake, stout Guendolen,4 Renowmed Martia, and redoubted Emmilen.5

55

“And that, which more then all the rest may sway, Late dayes ensample, which these eyes beheld, In the last field before Menevia 6 Which Uther with those forrein Pagans held, I saw a Saxon Virgin, the which feld Great Ulfin7 thrise upon the bloodly playne, And had not Carados 8 her hand withheld From rash revenge, she had him surely slayne, Yet Carados himselfe from her escapt with payne.”

1

emprize: enterprise. paragone: emulation. 3 Bunduca: Queen Boadicea, whose realm was in eastern Britain. She led an unsuccessful revolt against the Roman occupation in the first century CE. 4 stout: proud; brave; hardy; Guendolen: her husband, Locrine, King of Cornwall, put Guendolen aside and took up with another woman, Estrild. Guendolen sent an army against her husband, had him killed, and ordered that Estrild and her daughter be thrown into the Severn River. Guendolen then ruled as Queen of Cornwall for many years. 5 Martia: Dame Mertia, mentioned in II.x.42 as being the wife of King Guitheline, possibly a fairy, and worthy of praise for her proposals of many good laws; 2

redoubted: formidable; Emmilen: identity uncertain. 6 Menevia: St. David’s, on the most western tip of Wales. Here Uther fought the Saxons. 7 Ulfin: ally of Uther. When Uther lusted after a married woman, Ygerne, Ulfin advised him to consult Merlin. The magician disguised Uther and Ulfin as Ygerne’s husband, Gorlois, and Gorlois’ friend Jordan, so that they could gain access to Ygerne’s castle. After Uther slept with Ygerne, she gave birth to Arthur. In the following stanzas, Britomart and Glauce will insert Britomart symbolically into this unchaste story by disguising her as Uther’s enemy, the virginal Saxon warrior named Angela. 8 Carados: identity uncertain. Perhaps a king of Scotland.

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

66 56

“Ah read,” (quoth Britomart) “how is she1 hight?” “Fayre Angela”2 (quoth she) “men do her call, No whit lesse fayre,3 then terrible in fight: She hath the leading of a Martiall And mightie people, dreaded more then all The other Saxons, which doe for her sake And love, themselves of her name Angles call. Therefore faire Infant her ensample make Unto thy selfe, and equall corage4 to thee take.”

57

Her harty wordes so deepe into the mynd Of the yong Damzell sunke, that great desire Of warlike armes in her forthwith they tynd,5 And generous stout courage did inspyre, That she resolv’d, unweeting to her Syre,6 Advent’rous knighthood on her selfe to don, And counseld with her Nourse, her Maides attyre To turne into a massy habergeon,7 And bad her all things put in readinesse anon.

58

Th’old woman nought, that needed, did omit; But all thinges did conveniently purvay:8 It fortuned (so time their turne did fitt) A band of Britons ryding on forray Few dayes before, had gotten a great pray9 Of Saxon goods, emongst the which was seene A goodly Armour, and full rich aray, Which long’d10 to Angela, the Saxon Queene, All fretted round with gold, and goodly wel beseene.11

59

The same, with all the other ornaments, King Ryence caused to be hanged hy

1 2

she: the Saxon virgin.

Angela: Spenser invented this character, whose name is derived from the Latin name for England: Anglia. 3 fayre: beautiful. 4 I.e., therefore, beautiful noblewoman, take her as your example; corage: heart, but with puns on the meanings “sexual vigor” and “lust.”

5

tynd: ignited, kindled.

6

unweeting: unknown; Syre: father. massy habergeon: weighty chain-mail tunic. 8 purvay: see to, arrange, provide. 9 pray: plunder 10 long’d: belonged. 7

11

beseene: appearing.

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In his chiefe Church, for endlesse moniments1 Of his successe and gladfull victory: Of which her selfe avising2 readily, In th’evening late old Glauce thether led Faire Britomart, and that same Armory Downe taking, her therein appareled, Well as she might, and with brave bauldrick3 garnished. 60

Beside those armes there stood a mightie speare, Which Bladud 4 made by Magick art of yore, And usd the same in batteill aye to beare; Sith which it had beene here preserv’d in store, For his great vertues proved long afore: For never wight so fast in sell5 could sit, But him perforce unto the ground it bore:6 Both speare she tooke, and shield, which hong by it; Both speare and shield of great powre, for her purpose fit.

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Thus when she7 had the virgin all arayd, Another harnesse,8 which did hang thereby, About her selfe she dight, that the young Mayd She might in equall armes accompany, And as her Squyre attend her carefully: Tho to their ready Steedes they clombe full light,9 And through back waies, that none might them espy, Covered with secret cloud of silent night, Themselves they forth convaid, and passed forward right.

62

Ne rested they, till that to Faery lond They came, as Merlin them directed late: Where meeting with this Redcrosse knight, she fond10 Of diverse thinges discourses to dilate,11

1

5

2

6

moniments: monuments, trophies. avising: reminding. 3 brave: resplendent; bauldrick: a highly decorated belt or sash, worn across the chest and over one shoulder, used to hang one’s shield. 4 Bladud: Briton king famed for his magical knowledge; see II.x.25–6. Note that Britomart’s armor has both Saxon and Briton origins.

sell: saddle. We have already seen the spear’s power in i.6, with the unseating of Guyon. 7 she: Glauce. 8 harnesse: suit of armor. 9 clombe: climbed; light: lightly. 10 fond: found. 11 dilate: elaborate upon.

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But most of Arthegall, and his estate.1 At last their wayes so fell, that they mote part: Then each to other well affectionate, Friendship professed with unfained hart, The Redcrosse knight diverst,2 but forth rode Britomart.

1

estate: state, fortune.

2

diverst: diverted his course.

Canto Four Bold Marinell of Britomart, Is throwne on the Rich strond:1 Faire Florimell of 2 Arthure is Long followed, but not fond.

1

Where is the Antique glory now become,3 That whylome wont in wemen to appeare? Where be the brave atchievements doen by some? Where be the batteilles, where the shield and speare, And all the conquests, which them high did reare, That matter made for famous Poets verse, And boastfull men so oft abasht to heare? Beene they all dead, and laide in dolefull herse?4 Or doen they onely sleepe, and shall againe reverse?5

2

If they be dead, then woe is me therefore: But if they sleepe, O let them soone awake: For all too long I burne with envy6 sore, To heare the warlike feates, which Homere7 spake Of bold Penthesilee,8 which made a lake Of Greekish blood so ofte in Trojan plaine; But when I reade, how stout Debora9 strake

1

Aethiopis, which describes Penthesilea’s death at Achilles’ hands. Virgil also mentions Penthesilea in the Aeneid (1.490–93 and 11.661–3). 8 Penthesilee: Penthesilea, virginal warrior queen of the Amazons, who joined the Trojans in fighting the Greeks. Achilles finally slew her, but he then grieved for her. 9 Debora: in Judg. 4–5, Debora accompanies an army of Israelites and is able, through God’s help, to deliver Sisera, a Canaanite general, into their hands.

strond: shore. of: by. 3 become: come to be. 4 herse: funeral ceremonies; funeral poem. 5 reverse: turn themselves back (toward life); return (to life). 6 envy: admiration, with overtones of mortification at one’s own inferiority. 7 Homere: although neither the Iliad nor the Odyssey mentions Penthesilea, other poems were attributed to Homer, including 2

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Proud Sisera, and how Camill’ 1 hath slaine The huge Orsilochus, I swell with great disdaine.2 3

Yet these, and all that els had puissaunce, Cannot with noble Britomart compare, Aswell for glorie of great valiaunce, As for pure chastitie3 and vertue rare, That all her goodly deedes do well declare. Well worthie stock, from which the branches sprong, That in late yeares so faire a blossome bare, As thee, O Queene, the matter4 of my song, Whose lignage from this Lady I derive along.5

4

Who when through speaches with the Redcrosse knight, She learned had th’estate6 of Arthegall, And in each point7 her selfe informd aright, A frendly league of love perpetuall She with him bound, and Congé tooke withall.8 Then he forth on his journey did proceede, To seeke adventures, which mote him befall, And win him worship9 through his warlike deed, Which alwaies of his paines he made the chiefest meed.10

5

But Britomart kept on her former course, Ne ever dofte her armes,11 but all the way Grew pensive through that amarous discourse, By which the Redcrosse knight did earst display

1 Camill’: Camilla, a virginal warrior princess who never learned to spin wool (thus distinguishing herself from every proper woman in the Roman world), lived in the woods, and served Diana. She came to Aeneas’ aid and slew many of his enemies before herself being slain by Arruns, who had Apollo’s aid (Aeneid, 7.803 and 11.432–898). 2 Orsilochus: a Trojan general. See Aeneid, 11.690–91; disdaine: contempt; indignation (toward the slain men). 3 chastitie: this is the first time that the speaker has explicitly called Britomart chaste.

4 O Queene: Elizabeth Tudor; matter: subject. 5 along: from one end to the other. 6 estate: state, condition, fortune. 7 each point: each detail. 8 him: Redcrosse; Congé: courteous goodbyes; withall: in addition, moreover. 9 worship: honor, a good reputation. 10 I.e., which (honor) he always considered the chief reward for his efforts. 11 In Malecasta’s castle, Britomart learned her lesson about keeping her armor on.

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Her lovers shape, and chevalrous aray; A thousand thoughts she fashiond in her mind, And in her feigning1 fancie did pourtray Him such, as fittest she for love could find, Wise, warlike, personable, courteous, and kind. 6

With such selfe-pleasing thoughts her wound she fedd, And thought so to beguile2 her grievous smart; But so her smart was much more grievous bredd, And the deepe wound more deep engord her hart, That nought but death her dolour mote depart.3 So forth she rode without repose or rest, Searching all lands and each remotest part, Following the guydaunce of her blinded guest,4 Till that to the seacoast at length she her addrest.5

7

There she alighted from her light-foot beast, And sitting downe upon the rocky shore, Badd her old Squyre unlace her lofty creast; Tho having vewd a while the surges hore,6 That gainst the craggy clifts did loudly rore, And in their raging surquedry disdaynd,7 That the fast earth affronted them so sore, And their devouring covetize8 restraynd, Thereat she sighed deepe, and after thus complaynd.9

1

feigning: a pun on “fain” and “feign”; her fancy is both desiring and—thus far— the creator of that which it desires. 2 beguile: charm away; divert (her) attention from. 3 dolour: physical or mental suffering; depart: send away. 4 her blinded guest: Cupid, who wears a blindfold and shoots people at random with the darts of love (and, in some sources, with the darts of hate). 5 her addrest: directed her course. 6 surges hore: hoary wave (hoary presumably from white foam).

7 surquedry: arrogance; disdaynd: were indignant. 8 covetize: covetousness. 9 Britomart’s complaint takes the form of a well-known genre of poetry, the plaint, in which the speaker, usually in a monologue, complains about unrequited love or the world’s unfairness and asks for relief. The Renaissance plaint often uses Petrarchan devices, such as the pathetic fallacy (the projection of the speaker’s emotion onto his or her natural surroundings). Cf. Cymoent’s plaint at stanzas 36 through 39 and Arthur’s at stanzas 55 through 60.

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8

“Huge sea of sorrow, and tempestuous griefe, Wherein my feeble barke1 is tossed long, Far from the hoped haven of reliefe, Why doe thy cruel billowes beat so strong, And thy moyst mountaines each on others throng, Threatning to swallow up my fearefull lyfe? O doe thy cruell wrath and spightfull wrong At length allay, and stint2 thy stormy stryfe, Which in thy troubled bowels raignes, and rageth ryfe.

9

“For els my feeble vessell crazd,3 and crackt Through thy strong buffets and outrageous blowes, Cannot endure, but needes it must be wrackt4 On the rough rocks, or on the sandy shallowes, The whiles that love it steres, and fortune rowes; Love my lewd5 Pilott hath a restless minde And fortune Boteswaine no assuraunce knowes, But saile withouten starres, gainst tyde and winde: How can they other doe, sith both are bold and blinde?6

10

“Thou God of windes, that raignest7 in the seas, That raignest also in the Continent,8 At last blow up some gentle gale of ease, The which may bring my ship, ere it be rent,9 Unto the gladsome port of her10 intent: Then when I shall my selfe in safety see, A table11 for eternall moniment Of thy great grace, and my great jeopardee, Great Neptune,12 I avow to hallow unto thee.”

1

barke: boat. stint: cease. 3 crazd: cracked (with or without being broken apart). 4 wrackt: wrecked. 5 lewd: ignorant; evil; unchaste. Imagine commas before “my” and after “Pilott,” making the phrase an appositive to “Love.” 6 These are all common Petrarchan similes. 2

7

raignest: pun on “reigns” and “rains.” Continent: land, but with a pun on the meaning “sexually self-restrained.” 9 rent: torn asunder. 10 her: the ship’s. 11 table: votive tablet often dedicated to a god by a mariner who had come home safely. 12 Neptune: god of the sea. 8

Canto Four

11

Then sighing softly sore, and inly deepe, She shut up all her plaint in privy1 griefe; For her great courage would not let her weepe, Till that old Glauce gan with sharpe repriefe,2 Her to restraine, and give her good reliefe, Through hope of those, which Merlin had her told Should of her name and nation be chiefe, And fetch their being from the sacred mould Of her immortall womb, to be in heaven enrold.

12

Thus as she her recomforted, she3 spyde, Where far away one all in armour bright, With hasty gallop towards her did ryde;4 Her dolour5 soone she ceast, and on her dight Her Helmet, to her Courser mounting light: Her former sorrow into suddein wrath, Both coosen passions of distroubled6 spright, Converting, forth she beates the dusty path; Love and despight attonce her courage kindled hath.

13

As when a foggy mist hath overcast The face of heven, and the cleare ayre engroste,7 The world in darkenes dwels, till that at last The watry Southwinde from the seabord coste Upblowing, doth disperse the vapour lo’ste,8 And poures it selfe forth in a stormy showre; So the fayre Britomart having disclo’ste9 Her clowdy care into a wrathfull stowre, The mist of griefe dissolv’d, did into vengeance powre.

14

Eftsoones her goodly shield addressing fayre,10 That mortall speare she in her hand did take, And unto battaill did her selfe prepayre.

1

privy: private. repriefe: reproof. 3 The first “she” is Glauce; the second, Britomart. 4 Allegorically speaking, she is bound to be confronted by an angry stranger at this point, because she is ready for one to appear. Her distress over her unremitting inner pain is transferred, in psychologically 2

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understandable fashion, into a readiness to punch someone, anyone. 5 dolour: suffering; expression of suffering. 6 distroubled: very troubled. 7 engroste: condensed. 8 lo’ste: loosed. 9 disclo’ste: disclosed, opened up, freed. 10 addressing fayre: directing well.

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The knight approching, sternely her bespake; “Sir knight, that doest thy voyage rashly make By this forbidden way in my despight,1 Ne doest by others death ensample2 take, I read thee soone retyre, whiles thou hast might, Least afterwards it be too late to take thy flight.” 15

Ythrild with deepe disdaine of his proud threat, She shortly thus; “Fly they, that need to fly; Wordes fearen babes.3 I meane not thee entreat To passe; but maugre4 thee will passe or dy.” Ne lenger stayd for th’other to reply, But with sharpe speare the rest5 made dearly knowne. Strongly the straunge knight ran, and sturdily Strooke her full on the brest, that made her downe Decline her head, and touch her crouper6 with her crown.

16

But she againe him in the shield did smite With so fierce furie and great puissaunce, That through his threesquare scuchin7 percing quite, And through his mayled hauberque, by mischaunce8 The wicked steele through his left side9 did glaunce; Him so transfixed she before her bore Beyond his croupe,10 the length of all her launce, Till sadly soucing11 on the sandy shore, He tombled on an heape, and wallowd in his gore.

17

Like as the sacred Oxe, that carelesse12 stands, With gilden hornes, and flowry girlonds crownd,13 Proud of his dying honor and deare bandes,14

1

in my despight: in contempt of me. ensample: example. 3 I.e., words frighten (only) babies. 4 maugre: despite. 5 the rest: i.e., the rest of what she had to say. 6 crouper: horse’s rump. 7 threesquare scuchin: triangular escutcheon (shield). 8 mayled hauberque: chain-mail tunic; mischaunce: bad luck. 2

9

Note that his left side is near his heart. croupe: crouper. 11 sadly soucing: heavily thumping; fully soaking (himself) with water. 12 carelesse: without cares. 13 In the ancient world, an ox intended for sacrifice was decked with gold and flowers. 14 dying honor: honor that attends his dying (as a sacrifice); deare bandes: precious garlands or bonds. 10

Canto Four

75

Whiles th’altars fume with frankincense arownd, All suddeinly with mortall stroke astownd,1 Doth groveling fall, and with his streaming gore Distaines2 the pillours, and the holy grownd, And the faire flowres, that decked him afore; So fell proud Marinell 3 upon the pretious shore. 18

The martiall Mayd stayd not him to lament, But forward rode, and kept her ready4 way Along the strond, which as she over-went, She saw bestrowed all with rich aray Of pearles and pretious stones of great assay,5 And all the gravell mixt with golden owre; Whereat she wondred much, but would not stay For gold, or perles, or pretious stones an howre, But them despised all; for all was in her powre.6

19

Whiles thus he lay in deadly stonishment, Tydings hereof came to his mothers eare; His mother was the blacke-browd Cymoent, The daughter of great Nereus,7 which did beare This warlike sonne unto an earthly peare,8 The famous Dumarin; who on a day9 Finding the Nymph a sleepe in secret wheare,10 As he by chaunce did wander that same way, Was taken with her love, and by her closely lay.

20

There he this knight of her begot, whom borne She of his father Marinell did name, And in a rocky cave as wight11 forlorne,

1

astownd: astounded, stunned. Distaines: stains. 3 Marinell: the opposing knight’s name, which connects him with the sea—and with Florimell, whose investment in Marinell will be revealed at v.8–10. 4 ready: direct, straight. 5 assay: value. 6 This is a phrase ripe for interpretation. We must ask ourselves what the relationship is among her power of chastity, her power 2

of resisting diversions, and her power of scorning riches. 7 Nereus: a god of the sea. 8 I.e., who was impregnated by a mortal mate. 9 Dumarin: of the sea; seaworthy; like a mariner; on a day: one day. 10 wheare: place (as in “somewhere”). 11 rocky cave: Spenser’s caves are often linked with hidden passions or perplexing emotional states; wight: person.

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Long time she fostred up, till he became A mighty man at armes, and mickle1 fame Did get through great adventures by him donne: For never man he suffred2 by that same Rich strond to travell, whereas3 he did wonne, But that he must do battail with the Sea-nymphes sonne. 21

An hundred knights of honorable name He had subdew’d, and them his vassals made, That through all Farie lond his noble fame Now blazed4 was, and feare did all invade, That none durst passen through that perilous glade. And to advaunce his name and glory more, Her Sea-god syre she dearely did perswade,5 T’endow her sonne with threasure and rich store, Bove6 all the sonnes, that were of earthly wombes ybore.

22

The God did graunt his daughters deare7 demaund, To doen his Nephew8 in all riches flow; Eftsoones his heaped waves he did commaund, Out of their hollow bosome forth to throw All the huge threasure, which the sea below Had in his greedy gulfe devoured deepe, And him enriched through the overthrow And wreckes9 of many wretches, which did weepe, And often wayle their wealth, which he from them did keepe.

23

Shortly upon that shore there heaped was, Exceeding riches and all pretious things, The spoyle of all the world, that it did pas The wealth of th’East, and pompe of Persian kings; Gold, amber, yvorie, perles, owches,10 rings, And all that els was pretious and deare,

1

7

2

8

mickle: much, great (quantity). suffred: allowed. 3 whereas: where. 4 blazed: proclaimed. 5 perswade: intreat. 6 Bove: above.

deare: expensive. Nephew: grandson. 9 wreckes: shipwrecks. 10 amber: alloy of four parts gold to one of silver; amber, the precious resin; owches: brooches (often set with precious stones).

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77

The sea unto him voluntary brings, That shortly he a great Lord did appeare, As was in all the lond of Faery, or else wheare. 24

Thereto he was a doughty1 dreaded knight, Tryde often to the scath of many Deare,2 That none in equall armes him matchen might, The which his mother seeing, gan to feare Least his too haughtie hardines might reare3 Some hard mishap, in hazard of his life: For thy she oft him counseld to forbeare The bloody batteill, and to stirre up strife, But after all his warre, to rest his wearie knife.

25

And for his more assuraunce,4 she inquir’d One day of Proteus by his mighty spell, (For Proteus was with prophecy inspir’d) Her deare sonnes destiny to her to tell, And the sad end of her sweet Marinell. Who through foresight of his5 eternall skill, Bad her from womankind to keepe him well: For of a woman he should have much ill, A virgin straunge and stout him should dismay,6 or kill.

26

For thy she gave him warning every day, The love of women not to entertaine; A lesson too too hard for living clay,7 From love in course of nature to refraine: Yet he his mothers lore did well retaine, And ever from fayre Ladies love did fly; Yet many Ladies fayre did oft complaine, That they for love of him would algates8 dy: Dy, who so list9 for him, he was loves enimy.

1

Thereto: additionally; doughty: valiant, worthy. 2 I.e., often proved to be severely injurious to many. 3 hardines: courage; reare: cause. 4 assuraunce: safety. 5 his: Proteus’. 6 straunge: unknown; foreign; dismay: defeat.

7

clay: referring to the Biblical notion that humans come from earth and are, like everything that comes from the earth, imperfect and impermanent. 8 algates: at any rate; notwithstanding; otherwise. 9 list: wished.

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27

But ah, who can deceive his destiny, Or weene by warning to avoyd his fate? That when he sleepes in most security, And safest seemes, him soonest doth amate,1 And findeth dew effect or soone or2 late. So feeble is the powre of fleshly arme. His mother bad him wemens love to hate, For she of womans force did feare no harme;3 So weening4 to have arm’d him, she did quite disarme.

28

This was that woman, this that deadly wownd, That Proteus prophecide should him dismay, The which his mother vainely did expownd, To be hart-wownding love, which should assay5 To bring her sonne unto his last decay.6 So ticle be the termes of mortall state,7 And full of subtile sophismes,8 which doe play With double sences, and with false debate, T’approve the unknowen purpose of eternall fate.

29

Too true the famous Marinell it fownd, Who through late triall, on that wealthy Strond Inglorious now lies in sencelesse swownd,9 Through heavy stroke of Britomartis hond.10 Which when his mother deare did understond, And heavy tidings heard, whereas she playd Amongst her watry sisters11 by a pond, Gathering sweete daffadillyes, to have made Gay girlonds,12 from the Sun their forheads fayr to shade,

30

Eftsoones both flowres and girlonds far away Shee flong, and her faire deawy locks yrent, To sorrow huge she turnd her former play,

1

amate: overwhelm. or . . . or: either . . . or. 3 I.e., she feared women’s love but not their martial might. 4 weening: believing. 5 assay: try. 6 decay: death. 2

7

ticle: not steadfast, fickle; insecure; mortall state: life on earth. 8 sophismes: sophistry. 9 swownd: swoon. 10 hond: hand. 11 watry sisters: the Nereids, sea nymphs and daughters of the sea god Nereus. 12 girlonds: garlands.

Canto Four

79

And gamesome merth to grievous dreriment:1 Shee threw her selfe downe on the Continent,2 Ne word did speake, but lay as in a swownd, Whiles al her sisters did for her lament, With yelling outcries, and with shrieking sowne; And every one did teare her girlond from her crowne. 31

Soone as shee up out of her deadly fitt Arose, shee bad her charett3 to be brought, And all her sisters, that with her did sitt, Bad eke attonce their charetts to be sought; Tho full of bitter griefe and pensife thought, She to her wagon clombe; clombe all the rest, And forth together went, with sorow fraught. The waves obedient to theyr beheast, Them yielded ready passage, and their rage surceast.

32

Great Neptune stoode amazed at their sight, Whiles on his broad rownd backe they softly slid And eke him selfe mournd at their mournfull plight, Yet wist4 not what their wailing ment, yet did For great compassion of their sorow, bid His mighty waters to them buxome5 bee: Eftesoones the roaring billowes still abid,6 And all the griesly Monsters of the See Stood gaping at their gate,7 and wondred them to see.

33

A teme of Dolphins raunged in aray, Drew the smooth charett of sad Cymoent; They were all taught by Triton,8 to obay To the long raynes, at her commaundement: As swifte as swallowes, on the waves they went, That their brode flaggy9 finnes no fome did reare, Ne bubling rowndell10 they behinde them sent; The rest of other fishes drawen weare, Which with their finny oars the swelling sea did sheare.

1

dreriment: dreariness. Continent: see note at 10.2. 3 charett: chariot. 4 wist: knew. 5 buxome: favorable, welcoming. 6 abid: became and/or remained still. 2

7

gate: passage; manner of going. Triton: sea god, son of Neptune, and part dolphin. 8 9

flaggy: drooping. rowndell: swirls of foam.

10

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34

Soone as they bene arriv’d upon the brim Of the Rich strond, their charets they forlore,1 And let their temed fishes softly swim Along the margent of the fomy shore, Least they their finnes should bruze, and surbate2 sore Their tender feete upon the stony grownd: And comming to the place, where all in gore And cruddy3 blood enwallowed they fownd The lucklesse Marinell, lying in deadly swownd;

35

His mother swowned thrise, and the third time Could scarce recovered bee out of her paine; Had she not beene devoide of mortall slime, Shee should not then have bene relyv’d againe; But soone as life recovered had the raine,4 Shee made so piteous mone and deare wayment,5 That the hard rocks could scarse from tears refraine, And all her sister Nymphes with one consent6 Supplide her sobbing breaches7 with sad complement.

36

“Deare image of my selfe,” (she sayd) “that is, The wretched sonne of wretched mother borne, Is this thine high advauncement, O is this Th’immortall name, with which thee yet unborne Thy Gransire Nereus promist to adorne? Now lyest thou of life and honor refte;8 Now lyest thou a lumpe of earth forlorne, Ne of thy late life memory is lefte, Ne can thy irrevocable desteny bee wefte?9

1

forlore: left; abandoned. surbate: bruise. 3 cruddy: curdled. 4 raine: reign. 5 wayment: wailing. 6 consent: accord. 7 breaches: pauses (between sobs). 8 refte: bereft. 2

9

wefte: done away with or avoided. The meaning is clear from the context, although the OED does not give an appropriate definition for this time period. But Spenser’s weft may be an alternative spelling for wafte, a past tense of waive, “to avoid” (OED v16a). Given that weft is also an alternative spelling for waft (sb1), one might speculate that it could serve as a past participle of waft (v12), “convey safely by water,” appropriate for Marinell’s destiny.

Canto Four

81

37

“Fond1 Proteus, father of false prophecis, And they more fond, that credit to thee give, Not this the worke of womans hand ywis,2 That so deepe wound through these deare members3 drive. I feared love: but they that love doe live, But they that dye, doe nether love nor hate. Nath’lesse to thee thy folly I forgive, And to my selfe, and to accursed fate The guilt I doe ascribe: deare wisedom bought too late.

38

“O what availes it of immortall seed To beene ybredd and never borne to dye? Farre better I it deeme to die with speed, Then waste in woe and waylfull miserye. Who dyes the utmost dolor doth abye,4 But who that lives, is lefte to waile his losse: So life is losse, and death felicity. Sad life worse then5 glad death: and greater crosse To see frends grave, then dead the grave self to engrosse.

39

“But if the heavens did his dayes envie, And my short blis maligne,6 yet mote they well Thus much afford7 me, ere that he did die That the dim eies of my deare Marinell I mote have closed, and him bed farewell, Sith other offices for mother meet8 They would not graunt.9 Yett maulgre10 them farewell, my sweetest sweet; Farewell my sweetest sonne, till we againe may meet.”

40

Thus when they all had sorowed their fill, They softly gan to search his griesly wownd: And that they might him handle more at will, They him disarmd, and spredding on the grownd

1

Fond: foolish. ywis: I know. 3 members: limbs. 4 abye: abide, endure. 5 then: than. 6 maligne: resent; contrive against. 2

7

afford: grant. meet: appropriate. 9 The incomplete line may represent Cymoent’s breaking off to weep or to grieve silently. 10 maulgre: despite. 8

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Their watchet1 mantles frindgd with silver rownd, They softly wipt away the gelly blood From th’orifice; which having well upbownd, They pourd in soveraine2 balme, and Nectar good, Good both for erthly med’cine, and for hevenly food. 41

Tho when the lilly handed Liagore, (This Liagore whilome had learned skill In leaches craft, by great Appolloes lore,3 Sith her whilome upon high Pindus hill, He loved, and at last her wombe did fill With hevenly seed, whereof wise Pæon4 sprong) Did feele his pulse, shee knew there staied still Some litle life his feeble sprites emong; Which to his mother told, despeyre she from her flong.

42

Tho up him taking in their tender hands, They easely unto her charett beare: Her teme at her commaundement quiet stands, Whiles they the corse5 into her wagon reare, And strowe with flowres the lamentable beare:6 Then all the rest into their coches clim,7 And through the brackish waves their passage shear; Upon great Neptunes necke they softly swim, And to her watry chamber swiftly carry him.

43

Deepe in the bottome of the sea, her bowre Is built of hollow billowes heaped hye,8 Like to thicke clouds, that threat a stormy showre, And vauted9 all within, like to the Skye, In which the Gods doe dwell eternally: There they him laide in easy couch10 well dight;

1

6

2

7

watchet: light blue. soveraine: supremely efficacious. 3 leaches: physician’s; lore: learning. 4 Pæon: physician to the gods. 5 corse: body (not necessarily dead).

beare: bier, stretcher. clim: climb. 8 Compare Spenser’s bowers with his caves. 9 vauted: vaulted. 10 couch: bed.

Canto Four

83

And sent in haste for Tryphon,1 to apply Salves to his wounds, and medicines of might: For Tryphon of sea gods the soveraine leach2 is hight. 44

The whiles the Nymphes sitt all about him rownd, Lamenting his mishap and heavy plight; And ofte his mother vewing his wide wownd, Cursed the hand, that did so deadly smight Her dearest sonne, her dearest harts delight. But none of all those curses overtooke The warlike Maide, th’ensample of that might, But fairely well shee thryvd, and well did brooke3 Her noble deeds, ne her right course for ought forsooke.

45

Yet did false Archimage4 her still pursew, To bring to passe his mischievous intent, Now that he had her singled from the crew5 Of courteous knights, the Prince, and Fary gent,6 Whom late in chace of beauty excellent Shee lefte,7 pursewing that same foster strong; Of whose fowle outrage they impatient, And full of firy zele, him followed long, To reskew her from shame, and to revenge her wrong.

46

Through thick and thin, through mountains and through playns, Those two gret champions did attonce8 pursew The fearefull damzell, with incessant payns: Who from them fled, as light-foot hare from vew Of hunter swifte, and sent of howndes trew.9

1

Tryphon: brother of the immortal physician Aesculapius. 2 leach: physician. 3 thryvd: thrived; brooke: bear. 4 Archimage: Archimago is one of the main villains of Books One and Two, disguising himself in order to pursue, tempt, and plot against Redcrosse, Sir Guyon, and their allies. He represents hypocrisy and is sometimes associated with Roman Catholicism. This is his last appearance in the poem, and the fact that his presence here seems pointless may be the result of Spenser’s unfin-

ished plotting. Nonetheless, his almost random intrusion adds to the sense that Britomart is only partly aware of the perils that surround her. Her conscious anxieties are overdetermined. 5 crew: group. 6 I.e., Arthur and Sir Guyon; gent: having the qualities of a gentle-born person. 7 See i.15–19; foster: forester; see i.17. 8 attonce: together. 9 trew: accurate (hounds) or certain (scent).

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

84

At last they came unto a double way,1 Where, doubtfull which to take, her to reskew, Themselves they did dispart, each to assay,2 Whether more happy were, to win so goodly pray.3 47

But Timias, the Princes gentle Squyre, That Ladies love unto his Lord forlent,4 And with proud envy, and indignant yre, After that wicked foster fiercely went. So beene they three three sondry wayes ybent.5 But fayrest fortune to the Prince befell, Whose chaunce it was, that soone he did repent, To take that way, in which that Damozell Was fledd afore, affraid of him, as feend of hell.

48

At last of her far off he gained vew: Then gan he freshly pricke his fomy steed, And ever as he nigher6 to her drew, So evermore he did increase his speed, And of each turning still kept wary heed: Alowd to her he oftentimes did call, To doe away7 vaine doubt, and needlesse dreed: Full myld to her he spake, and oft let fall Many meeke wordes, to stay and comfort her withall.

49

But nothing might relent8 her hasty flight; So deepe the deadly feare of that foule swaine9 Was earst impressed in her gentle spright: Like as a fearefull Dove, which through the raine, Of the wide ayre her way does cut amaine, Having farre off espyde a Tassell10 gent,

1

double way: fork in the path. dispart: split up; assay: test. 3 Whether: which; pray: prey. 4 forlent: gave up entirely. 5 ybent: directed. 6 nigher: closer. 7 To doe away: to do away with. 2

8

relent: abate.

9 swaine: man; man of low degree; laborer; wooer. Although the word clearly applies to the Forester in this context, it is important that it can also obliquely apply to Arthur, who is, after all, also chasing Florimell. 10 Tassell: male falcon, a bird of prey tamed and used by hunters to bring down other birds.

Canto Four

85

Which after her his nimble winges doth straine, Doubleth her hast for feare to bee for-hent,1 And with her pineons cleaves the liquid2 firmament. 50

With no lesse hast, and eke with no lesse dreed, That fearefull Ladie fledd from him, that ment To her no evill thought, nor evill deed; Yet former feare of being fowly shent,3 Carried her forward with her first intent: And though oft looking backward, well she vewde, Her selfe freed from that foster insolent,4 And that it was a knight, which now her sewde,5 Yet she no lesse the knight feard, then that villein6 rude.

51

His uncouth7 shield and straunge armes her dismayd, Whose like in Faery lond were seldom seene, That fast she from him fledd, no lesse afrayd, Then of wilde beastes if she had chased beene: Yet he her followd still with corage8 keene, So long that now the golden Hesperus9 Was mounted high in top of heaven sheene,10 And warnd his other brethren joyeous, To light their blessed lamps in Joves11 eternall hous.

1

for-hent: seized. liquid: transparent like water; fluid like water. 3 shent: disgraced; defiled. 4 insolent: presumptuously insulting; immoderate. 5 sewde: pursued (with a pun on “sued,” courted). 6 villein: originally a serf; by the sixteenth century, it was nearly impossible to tell whether the speaker meant “serf ” or “baseminded wretch,” given that the two social categories were both cause for contempt. 7 uncouth: unusual. Arthur keeps his shield covered, presumably with a cloth. Merlin fashioned it of pure diamond, and 2

not only is it impervious to weapons, but its brightness daunts monsters on the rare occasions when Arthur pulls aside its veil. It reveals foes’ disguises, turns rascals into stones, turns stones into dust, turns dust into nothing, and blinds the proud (I.vii.33–35). 8 corage: heart; lust. The second definition is especially important here, though the surrounding praise of Arthur points toward the first definition as primary. 9 Hesperus: the evening star, which Spenser calls “the lampe of love” in his poem the Epithalamion (288). 10 sheene: beautiful; shining. 11 Joves: belonging to the king of the Roman gods.

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52

All suddeinly dim wox the dampish ayre, And griesly shadowes covered heaven bright, That now with thousand starres was decked fayre; Which when the Prince beheld, a lothfull sight, And that perforce, for want1 of lenger light, He mote surceasse his suit, and lose the hope Of his long labour, he gan fowly wyte2 His wicked fortune, that had turnd aslope,3 And cursed night, that reft from him so goodly scope.4

53

Tho when her wayes he could no more descry, But to and fro at disaventure5 strayd; Like as a ship, whose Lodestar suddeinly Covered with cloudes, her Pilott hath dismayd; His wearisome pursuit perforce6 he stayd, And from his loftie steed dismounting low, Did let him forage. Downe himselfe he layd Upon the grassy ground, to sleepe a throw;7 The cold earth was his couch, the hard steele his pillow.

54

But gentle Sleepe envyde him any rest; In stead thereof sad sorow, and disdaine Of his hard hap did vexe his noble brest, And thousand fancies bett8 his ydle brayne With their light wings, the sights of semblants vaine:9 Oft did he wish, that Lady faire mote bee His faery Queene, for whom he did complaine:10 Or that his Faery Queene were such, as shee:11 And ever hastie Night he blamed bitterlie.

1

9

2

10

want: lack. wyte: blame. 3 aslope: aslant, athwart. 4 scope: view. 5 at disaventure: according to mischance; aimlessly and with poor results. 6 perforce: of necessity. 7 a throw: a while. 8 bett: beat.

semblants vaine: useless images. Arthur is in love with, and is searching for, the Faerie Queen, Gloriana, whom he has seen only in an erotic dream (I.ix.13–16). He complains for her not on her behalf, but with frustrated desire for her. 11 shee: the woman whom he wants to rescue from the Forester.

Canto Four

55

“Night thou foule Mother of annoyaunce sad, Sister of heavie death, and nourse of woe, Which wast begot in heaven, but for thy bad And brutish shape thrust downe to hell below, Where by the grim floud of Cocytus1 slow Thy dwelling is, in Herebus2 black hous, (Black Herebus thy husband is the foe Of all the Gods) where thou ungratious, Halfe of thy dayes doest lead in horrour hideous.

56

“What had th’eternall Maker need of thee, The world in his continuall course to keepe, That doest all thinges deface, ne lettest see The beautie of his worke? Indeed in sleepe The slouthfull body, that doth love to steep His lustlesse limbes, and drowne his baser mind,3 Doth praise thee oft, and oft from Stygian4 deepe Calles thee, his goddesse in his errour blind, And great Dame Natures handmaide, chearing every kind.

57

“But well I wote,5 that to an heavy hart Thou art the roote and nourse of bitter cares, Breeder of new, renewer of old smarts: In stead of rest thou lendest rayling6 teares, In stead of sleepe thou sendest troublous feares, And dreadfull visions, in the which alive The dreary image of sad death appeares: So from the wearie spirit thou doest drive Desired rest, and men of happinesse deprive.

58

“Under thy mantle blacke there hidden lye, Light-shonning thefte, and traiterous intent, Abhorred bloodshed, and vile felony, Shamefull deceipt, and daunger imminent; Fowle horror, and eke hellish dreriment: All these I wote in thy protection bee,

1

4

2

5

Cocytus: the river of lamentation in hell. Herebus: Erebus, god of darkness. 3 lustlesse: listless; baser: too base.

87

Stygian: of Styx, a river in hell; of hell. wote: wot, know. 6 rayling: gushing; loudly complaining.

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And light doe shonne, for feare of being shent:1 For light ylike is loth’d of them and thee, And all that lewdnesse love, doe hate the light to see. 59

“For day discovers all dishonest wayes, And sheweth each thing, as it is in deed: The prayses of high God he faire displayes, And his large bountie rightly doth areed. The children of day2 be the blessed seed, Which darknesse shall subdue, and heaven win: Truth is his daughter; he her first did breed, Most sacred virgin, without spot of sinne. Our life is day, but death with darknesse doth begin.

60

“O when will day then turne to me againe, And bring with him his long expected light? O Titan, hast to reare thy joyous waine:3 Speed thee to spred abroad thy beames bright, And chace away this too long lingring night, Chace her away, from whence she came, to hell. She, she it is, that hath me done despight: There let her with the damned spirits dwell, And yield her rowme to day, that can it governe well.”

61

Thus did the Prince that wearie night outweare, In restlesse anguish and unquiet paine: And earely, ere the morrow did upreare His deawy head out of the Ocean maine, He up arose, as halfe in great disdaine, And clombe4 unto his steed. So forth he went, With heavy looke and lumpish5 pace, that plaine In him bewraid great grudge and maltalent:6 His steed eke seemd t’apply his steps to his intent.

1

4

2

5

shent: digraced. “Dayes dearest children” (1596 ed.). Cf. 1 Thess. 5.4–8. 3 Titan: the sun god; waine: chariot; wagon.

clombe: climbed. lumpish: lethargic. 6 bewraid: revealed; maltalent: ill temper.

Canto Five Prince Arthur heares of Florimell: three fosters1 Timias wound, Belphebe findes him almost dead, and reareth out of sownd.2

1

Wonder it is to see, in diverse mindes, How diversly love doth his pageaunts play,3 And shewes his powre in variable kindes:4 The baser wit, whose ydle thoughts alway Are wont to cleave5 unto the lowly clay, It stirreth up to sensuall desire, And in lewd slouth to wast his carelesse day: But in brave sprite it kindles goodly fire, That to all high desert and honour doth aspire.

2

Ne suffereth6 it uncomely idlenesse, In his free thought to build her sluggish nest: Ne suffereth it thought of ungentlenesse, Ever to creepe into his noble brest, But to the highest and the worthiest Lifteth it up, that els would lowly fall: It lettes not fall, it lettes it not to rest: It lettes not scarse this Prince to breath at all, But to his first poursuit7 him forward still doth call.

3

Who long time wandred through the forest wyde, To finde some issue thence,8 till that at last He met a Dwarfe, that seemed terrifyde With some late perill, which he hardly past, Or other accident, which him aghast;

1

5

2

6

fosters: foresters. sownd: swoon. 3 I.e., puts on various disguises, acting out various roles. 4 kindes: natures.

wont to cleave: used to cling. suffereth: allows. 7 I.e., his quest to find the Faerie Queen. 8 I.e., to find a way out.

89

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

Of whom he asked, whence he lately came, And whether1 now he traveiled so fast: For sore he swat,2 and ronning through that same Thicke forest, was bescracht, and both his feet nigh3 lame. 4

Panting for breath, and almost out of hart, The Dwarfe him answerd, “Sir, ill4 mote I stay To tell the same. I lately did depart From Faery court, where I have many a day Served a gentle Lady of great sway,5 And high accompt through out all Elfin6 land, Who lately left the same, and tooke this way: Her now I seeke, and if ye understand Which way she fared hath, good Sir tell out of hand.”

5

“What mister7 wight” (saide he) “and how arayd?” “Royally clad” (quoth he) “in cloth of gold, As meetest may beseeme8 a noble mayd; Her faire lockes in rich circlet be enrold,9 A fayrer wight did never Sunne behold, And on a Palfrey rydes more white then snow, Yet she her selfe is whiter manifold: The surest signe, whereby ye may her know, Is, that she is the fairest wight alive, I trow.”

6

“Now certes swaine” (saide he) “such one I weene, Fast flying through this forest from her fo, A foule ill favoured foster, I have seene; Her selfe, well as I might, I reskewd tho, But could not stay; so fast she did foregoe, Carried away with wings of speedy feare.”

1

whether: whither. swat: sweated. 3 bescracht: thoroughly scratched; nigh: nearly. 4 ill: scarcely; with bad results. 5 sway: power, influence. 6 accompt: account, reputation; Elfin: Faerie. 2

7

mister: sort, type. meetest: most appropriately; beseeme: appear (on). 9 circlet: ornamental metal or ribbon band worn around the head; circle of twisted or braided hair; enrold: coiled; braided. 8

Canto Five

91

“Ah dearest God” (quoth he) “that is great woe, And wondrous ruth1 to all, that shall it heare. But can ye read Sir, how I may her finde, or where?” 7

“Perdy me lever were2 to weeten that,” (Saide he) “then ransome of the richest knight, Or all the good that ever yet I gat: But froward fortune, and too forward3 Night Such happinesse did, maulgre,4 to me spight, And fro me reft both life and light attone. But Dwarfe aread, what is that Lady bright, That through this forrest wandreth thus alone; For of her errour5 straunge I have great ruth and mone.”

8

“That Ladie is” (quoth he) “where so she bee, The bountiest virgin, and most debonaire,6 That ever living eye I weene did see; Lives none this day, that may with her compare In stedfast chastitie and vertue rare, The goodly ornaments of beautie bright; And is ycleped Florimell 7 the fayre, Faire Florimell belov’d of many a knight, Yet she loves none but one, that Marinell is hight.

9

“A Sea-nymphes sonne, that Marinell is hight, Of my deare Dame is loved dearely well; In other none, but him, she sets delight, All her delight is set on Marinell; But he sets nought at all by Florimell:8 For Ladies love his mother long ygoe Did him, they say, forwarne through sacred spell. But fame9 now flies, that of a forreine foe He is yslaine, which is the ground10 of all our woe.

1

ruth: cause of compassion or sorrow. Perdy: by God; me lever were: I had rather. 2

3 froward: adverse, untoward, counter to what is reasonable or desirable; inimical; forward: arriving too quickly. 4 maulgre: a generalized curse, like “dammit!”

5

errour: wandering. debonaire: gracious. 7 Florimell first entered the poem as the “goodly Lady” of i.15. Her name links her to Marinell, as well as to flowers. 8 I.e., he does not care for her. 9 fame: rumor. 10 ground: foundation, reason. 6

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10

“Five daies there be, since he (they say) was slaine, And fowre, since Florimell the Court forwent,1 And vowed never to returne againe, Till him alive or dead she did invent.2 Therefore, faire Sir, for love of knighthood gent, And honour of trew Ladies, if ye may By your good counsell, or bold hardiment, Or succour her, or3 me direct the way, Do one, or other good, I you most humbly pray.

11

“So may ye gaine to you full great renowme, Of all good Ladies through the world so wide, And haply in her hart finde highest rowme,4 Of whom ye seeke to be most magnifide:5 At least eternall meede shall you abide.”6 To whom the Prince; “Dwarfe, comfort to thee take, For till thou tidings learne, what her betide, I here avow thee never to forsake. Ill weares he armes, that nill them use for Ladies sake.”

12

So with the Dwarfe he backe retourn’d againe, To seeke his Lady, where he mote her finde; But by the way he greatly gan complaine The want of his good Squire late left behinde,7 For whom he wondrous pensive grew in minde, For doubt of daunger, which mote him betide;8 For him he loved above all mankinde, Having him trew and faithfull ever tride, And bold, as ever Squyre that waited by knights side.

13

Who all this while full hardly was assayd9 Of deadly daunger, which to him betidd;10 For whiles his Lord pursewd that noble Mayd,

1

forwent: left. invent: come upon, find. 3 Or . . . or: either . . . or. 4 rowme: room, place. 5 magnifide: praised. 6 meede: reward; shall you abide: shall wait for you. 2

7

See i.18.6–9. doubt: apprehensiveness, worry, fear; betide: befall. 9 Who: Arthur’s squire, Timias. Spenser is fond of transporting the narrative across time and space by the expedient of one relative pronoun; assayd: assailed. 10 betidd: befell. 8

Canto Five

After that foster fowle he fiercely ridd,1 To bene avenged of the shame, he did To that faire Damzell: Him he chaced long Through the thicke woods, wherein he would have hid His shamefull head from his avengement strong, And oft him threatned death for his outrageous wrong. 14

Nathlesse the villein2 sped himselfe so well, Whether through swiftnesse of his speedie beast, Or knowledge of those woods, where he did dwell, That shortly he from daunger was releast, And out of sight escaped at the least;3 Yet not escaped from the dew reward Of his bad deedes, which daily he increast, Ne ceased not, till him oppressed hard The heavie plague,4 that for such leachours is prepard.

15

For soone as he was vanisht out of sight, His5 coward courage gan emboldned bee, And cast t’avenge him of that fowle despight, Which he had borne of his bold enimee. Tho to his brethren came: for they were three Ungratious6 children of one gracelesse syre, And unto them complayned, how that he Had used beene of that foolehardie Squyre; So them with bitter words he stird to bloodie yre.

16

Forthwith themselves with their sad7 instruments Of spoyle and murder they gan arme bylive,8 And with him foorth into the forrest went, To wreake the wrath, which he did earst revive In their sterne brests, on him which late did drive Their brother to reproch and shamefull flight: For they had vow’d, that never he alive Out of that forest should escape their might; Vile rancour their rude harts had fild with such despight.

1

5

2

6

ridd: rode. villein: base character; serf. 3 at the least: at last. 4 plague: blow or wound.

His: the Forester’s. Ungratious: lacking spiritual grace. 7 sad: capable of causing sorrow. 8 bylive: speedily.

93

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17

Within that wood there was a covert glade, Foreby a narrow foord,1 to them well knowne, Through which it was uneath2 for wight to wade, And now by fortune it was overflowne:3 By that same way they knew that Squyre unknowne Mote algates passe; for thy themselves they set There in await, with thicke woods over growne, And all the while their malice they did whet With cruell threats, his passage through the ford to let.4

18

It fortuned, as they devized had, The gentle Squyre came ryding that same way, Unweeting of their wile and treason bad, And through the ford to passen did assay; But that fierce foster, which late fled away, Stoutly5 foorth stepping on the further shore, Him boldly bad his passage there to stay, Till he had made amends, and full restore6 For all the damage, which he had him doen afore.

19

With that at him a quiv’ring dart he threw, With so fell force and villeinous despite, That through his habericon7 the forkehead flew, And through the linked mayles8 empierced quite, But had no powre in his soft flesh to bite: That stroke the hardy Squire did sore displease, But more that him he could not come to smite;9 For by no meanes the high banke he could sease,10 But labour’d long in that deepe ford with vaine disease.11

20

And still the foster with his long bore-speare Him kept from landing at his wished will; Anone one sent out of the thicket neare

1

7

2

8

I.e., close by a narrow ford. uneath: difficult. 3 overflowne: overflowed, flooded. 4 let: prevent. Waiting for an enemy beside a narrow ford was a technique used by the Irish and known to Spenser. 5 Stoutly: with bravery. 6 restore: restitution.

habericon: habergeon, chain-mail tunic. mayles: individual links that make up chain mail. 9 I.e., it displeased the Squire even more that he could not get close enough to them to strike a blow. 10 sease: seize (i.e., climb to). 11 disease: uneasiness; trouble.

Canto Five

95

A cruell shaft, headed with deadly ill, And fethered with an unlucky quill; The wicked steele stayd not, till it did light In his left thigh, and deepely did it thrill:1 Exceeding griefe that wound in him empight,2 But more that with his foes he could not come to fight. 21

At last through wrath and vengeaunce making way, He on the bancke arryvd with mickle payne,3 Where the third brother him did sore assay, And drove at him with all his might and mayne A forest bill,4 which both his hands did strayne; But warily he did avoide the blow, And with his speare requited him agayne, That both his5 sides were thrilled with the throw, And a large streame of bloud out of the wound did flow.

22

He tombling downe, with gnashing teeth did bite The bitter earth, and bad to lett him in Into the balefull house of endlesse night, Where wicked ghosts doe waile their former sin. Tho gan the battaile freshly to begin; For nathemore for that spectacle bad, Did th’other two their cruell vengeaunce blin,6 But both attonce on both sides him bestad,7 And load upon him layd, his life for to have had.

23

Tho when that villayn he aviz’d,8 which late Affrighted had the fairest Florimell, Full of fiers fury, and indignant hate, To him he turned, and with rigor fell Smote him so rudely on the Pannikell,9

1

his: Timias’; thrill: pierce. “Thigh” is often a poetic euphemism for, or allegorical pointer to, “groin.” If that interpretation at first seems unlikely, it makes perfect sense the next time the location of Timias’ wound is mentioned, in stanza 42. 2 empight: emplanted. 3 mickle payne: much effort.

4

forest bill: tool used for pruning, with a long, concave blade sometimes ending in a hook. 5 his: those of the Forester’s second brother. 6 blin: cease. 7 bestad: beset. 8 he: Timias; aviz’d: saw, took note of; i.e., when Timias saw the Forester. 9 Pannikell: pate, skull.

96

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

That to the chin he clefte his head in twaine: Downe on the ground his carkas groveling fell; His sinfull sowle with desperate disdaine, Out of her fleshly ferme1 fled to the place of paine. 24

That seeing now the only last of three, Who with that wicked shafte him wounded had, Trembling with horror, as that did foresee The fearefull end of his avengement sad, Through which he follow should his brethren bad, His bootelesse2 bow in feeble hand upcaught, And therewith shott an arrow at the lad; Which fayntly fluttring, scarce his helmet raught,3 And glauncing fel to ground, but him annoyed naught.

25

With that he would have fled into the wood; But Timias him lightly overhent,4 Right as he entring was into the flood, And strooke at him with force so violent, That headlesse him into the foord he sent: The carcas with the streame was carried downe, But th’head fell backeward on the Continent. So mischief fel upon the meaners crowne;5 They three be dead with shame, the Squire lives with renowne.

26

He lives, but takes small joy of his renowne; For of that cruell wound he bled so sore, That from his steed he fell in deadly swowne; Yet still the blood forth gusht in so great store, That he lay wallowd all in his owne gore. Now God thee keepe, thou gentlest squire alive,

1

ferme: As Roche suggests in his note to this line, Spenser may mean “enclosure,” from the French verb “fermer,” “to close.” Alternatively, this may be the first instance of the use of a rare English word recorded by the OED only in 1620 and 1688, meaning “hole; cave; hiding place.” The body was often referred to piously as the prison of the soul, whose proper home was

heaven. Here, Spenser may be going a step further to imply that the Forester’s body is a lair for his beastly soul. 2 bootelesse: useless. 3

raught: reached. overhent: overtook. 5 meaners crowne: the head of one who intended mischief. 4

Canto Five

97

Els shall thy loving Lord1 thee see no more, But both of comfort him thou shalt deprive, And eke thy selfe of honor, which thou didst atchive. 27

Providence hevenly passeth2 living thought, And doth for wretched mens reliefe make way; For loe great grace or fortune thether3 brought Comfort to him, that comfortlesse now lay. In those same woods, ye well remember may, How that a noble hunteresse did wonne, Shee, that base Braggadochio did affray, And made him fast out of the forest ronne; Belphœbe was her name, as faire as Phœbus sunne.4

28

She on a day, as shee pursewd the chace Of some wilde beast, which with her arrowes keene She wounded had, the same along did trace By tract5 of blood, which she had freshly seene, To have besprinckled all the grassy greene, By the great persue,6 which she there perceav’d, Well hoped shee the beast engor’d had beene, And made more haste, the life to have bereav’d:7 But ah, her expectation greatly was deceav’d.

29

Shortly she came, whereas that woefull Squire With blood deformed,8 lay in deadly swownd: In whose faire eyes, like lamps of quenched fire,

1

Lord: Arthur. passeth: surpasses. 3 thether: thither. 4 Belphoebe is Spenser’s invention, though he aligns her with Diana, the chaste goddess of the hunt. In “The Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser explicitly names Belphoebe as one of the characters who represent aspects of Elizabeth Tudor. When Belphoebe makes her first appearance in Book Two, the narrator describes her as “borne of heavenly birth,” “Hable to heale the sick, and to revive the ded,” surpassingly beautiful, and having eyes that radiate “dredd Majestie” (II.iii.22–23). The bragging and cowardly 2

Braggadocchio attempts to embrace her; she vigorously repels him with her javelin and flees; he and his friend, Trompart, then quickly leave, as well (II.iii.34–46). The earlier passage could be interpreted as meaning that he and Trompart left quickly because they were reluctant to run into Belphoebe again. 5 tract: track. Timias has become the huntress’ quarry. 6

persue: the track of blood left by a wounded animal, such as a deer. 7 bereav’d: taken from the beast. 8 deformed: disfigured.

98

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

The Christall humor1 stood congealed rownd; His locks, like faded leaves fallen to grownd, Knotted with blood, in bounches rudely2 ran, And his sweete lips, on which before that stownd The bud of youth to blossome faire began, Spoild of their rosy red, were woxen pale and wan. 30

Saw never living eie more heavy sight, That could have made a rocke of stone to rew,3 Or rive in twaine: which when that Lady bright Besides all hope4 with melting eies did vew, All suddeinly abasht shee chaunged hew, And with sterne horror backward gan to start: But when shee better him beheld, shee grew Full of soft passion and unwonted smart: The point of pitty perced through her tender hart.

31

Meekely shee bowed downe, to weete if life Yett in his frosen members did remaine, And feeling by his pulses beating rife, That the weake sowle her seat did yett retaine, She cast to comfort him with busy paine: His double folded necke she reard upright, And rubd his temples, and each trembling vaine; His mayled habericon she did undight, And from his head his heavy burganet5 did light.

32

Into the woods thenceforth in haste shee went, To seeke for hearbes, that mote him remedy; For shee of herbes had great intendiment,6 Taught of the Nymphe, which from her infancy Her nourced had in trew Nobility: There, whether yt divine Tobacco7 were,

1

Christall humor: crystal-clear liquid in the eye. 2 rudely: in a disorderly fashion. 3 rew: rue, pity. 4 Besides all hope: having no hope that he was alive.

5

burganet: helmet with visor. intendiment: understanding. 7 Tobacco: introduced from the Americas by Raleigh in 1584 and at first thought to be healthful in its purging the body of phlegm. This is the first reference to tobacco in English imaginative literature. 6

Canto Five

99

Or Panachæa, or Polygony,1 Shee fownd, and brought it to her patient deare2 Who al this while lay bleding out his hart-blood neare. 33

The soveraine weede betwixt two marbles3 plaine Shee pownded small, and did in peeces bruze, And then atweene her lilly handes twaine, Into his wound the juice thereof did scruze,4 And round about, as she could well it uze, The flesh therewith shee suppled5 and did steepe, T’abate all spasme, and soke the swelling bruze, And after having searcht the intuse6 deepe, She with her scarf did bind the wound from cold to keepe.

34

By this he had sweet life recur’d7 agayne, And groning inly deepe, at last his eies, His watry eies, drizling like deawy rayne, He up gan lifte toward the azure skies, From whence descend all hopelesse8 remedies: Therewith he sigh’d, and turning him aside, The goodly Maide ful of divinities, And gifts of heavenly grace he by him spide, Her bow and gilden quiver lying him beside.

35

“Mercy deare Lord” (said he) “what grace is this, That thou hast shewed to me sinfull wight, To send thine Angell from her bowre of blis,9 To comfort me in my distressed plight? Angell, or Goddesse doe I call thee right? What service may I doe unto thee meete, That hast from darkenes me returnd to light, And with thy hevenly salves and med’cines sweete, Hast drest my sinfull wounds? I kisse thy blessed feete.”

1

Panachæa: panacea, the herb Heal-All; Polygony: an herb used in treating wounds. 2 deare: note the pun on her more usual quarry. 3 marbles: flat pieces of marble. 4 scruze: squeeze. 5 suppled: softened; massaged.

6

intuse: bruise. recur’d: recovered. 8 hopelesse: unhoped for, unexpected; for those who are (otherwise) hopeless. 9 Cf. Acrasia’s Bower of Bliss in II.vi and II.xii. 7

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

36

Thereat she blushing said, “Ah gentle Squire, Nor Goddesse I, nor Angell, but the Mayd, And daughter of a woody Nymphe, desire No service, but thy safety and ayd, Which if thou gaine, I shalbe well apayd. Wee mortall wights, whose lives and fortunes bee To commun accidents1 stil open layd, Are bownd with commun bond of frailtee, To succor wretched wights, whom we captived see.”

37

By this2 her Damzells, which the former chace Had undertaken after her, arryv’d, As did Belphœbe, in the bloody place, And thereby deemd the beast had bene depriv’d Of life, whom late their ladies arrow ryv’d: For thy the bloody tract they followd fast, And every one to ronne the swiftest stryv’d; But two of them the rest far overpast, And where their Lady was, arrived at the last.

38

Where when they saw that goodly boy, with blood Defowled, and their Lady dresse his wownd, They wondred much, and shortly understood, How him in deadly case theyr Lady fownd, And reskewed out of the heavy stownd. Eftsoones his warlike courser, which was strayd Farre in the woodes, whiles that he lay in swownd, She made those Damzels search, which being stayd,3 They did him4 set thereon, and forth with them convayd.

39

Into that forest farre they thence5 him led, Where was their dwelling, in a pleasant glade, With mountaines rownd about environed,6 And mightie woodes, which did the valley shade, And like a stately Theatre7 it made, Spreading it selfe into a spatious plaine.

1

4

2

5

accidents: chance occurrences. By this: by this time, at this time. 3 search: search for; stayd: stopped; taken captive.

him: Timias. thence: from there. 6 environed: encircling. 7 Theatre: natural amphitheater.

Canto Five

101

And in the midst a little river plaide Emongst the pumy1 stones, which seemd to plaine With gentle murmure, that his cours they did restraine. 40

Beside the same a dainty2 place there lay, Planted with mirtle3 trees and laurells greene, In which the birds song many a lovely lay4 Of gods high praise, and of their loves sweet teene,5 As it an earthly Paradize had beene: In whose enclosed shadow there was pight6 A faire Pavilion, scarcely to be seene,7 The which was al within most richly dight, That greatest Princes living it mote well delight.

41

Thether they brought that wounded Squyre, and layd In easie couch8 his feeble limbes to rest. He rested him a while, and then the Mayd His readie9 wound with better salves new drest; Daily she dressed him,10 and did the best His grievous hurt to guarish,11 that she might, That shortly she his dolour hath redrest, And his foule sore reduced to faire plight:12 It she reduced, but himselfe destroyed quight.13

42

O foolish physick, and unfruitfull paine,14 That heales up one and makes another wound: She his hurt thigh to him recurd15 againe,

1

pumy: pumice. dainty: delightful; choice. 3 mirtle: myrtles are sacred to Venus. 4 lay: song, usually about love. 5 teene: affliction; vexation; injury; suffering. 6 pight: pitched (as a tent). 7 Cf. Spenser’s other bowers, caves, and secret circular places—all the way to Mount Acidale in VI.x.5–31. They do not all serve the same allegorical function, but they play against each other. 8 easie: comfortable, conducive to ease; couch: bed. 9 readie: prepared; dressed. 10 I.e., his wound. 2

11

guarish: cure. reduced: brought back; restored—but given stanza 42, there is a peripheral pun here on the sense “brought under subjection”; faire plight: good condition, with peripheral puns on the senses “peril,” “guilt,” and even “pledge of marriage engagement.” 13 Compare Timias’ condition with that of the beast in stanza 37. 14 physick: medicine; medical care; unfruitfull: producing no good results; producing no child; paine: care or labor, with an obvious pun. 15 thigh: the possibility that this is a euphemism for “groin” in stanza 20 becomes clear here; recurd: recovered. 12

102

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

But hurt his hart, the which before was sound,1 Through an unwary dart, which did rebownd2 From her faire eyes and gratious countenaunce. What bootes3 it him from death to be unbownd, To be captived in endlesse duraunce4 Of sorrow and despeyre without aleggeaunce?5 43

Still as his wound did gather, and grow hole,6 So still his hart woxe sore, and health decayd: Madnesse to save a part, and lose the whole. Still whenas he beheld the heavenly Mayd, Whiles dayly playsters7 to his wownd she layd, So still his Malady the more increast, The whiles her matchlesse beautie him dismayd. Ah God, what other could he doe at least, But love so fayre a Lady, that his life releast?8

44

Long while he strove in his corageous brest, With reason dew9 the passion to subdew, And love for to dislodge out of his nest: Still when her excellencies he did vew, Her soveraine bountie, and celestiall hew,10 The same to love he strongly was constraynd:

1

sound: healthy. rebownd: leap out or arise from; bounce. The context suggests the former definition, but the latter is more common in sixteenthcentury texts, and it works well here as a pun. Light was thought to proceed from eyes; however, with the second sense of “rebownd,” Cupid’s dart does not proceed from Belphoebe’s eyes to Timias’ heart but bounces on her eyes and back out. This suggests that it originates with Timias, fails to hurt her, and returns to hurt him. It is relevant that sixteenth- and seventeenthcentury poets were fascinated with the reflection of oneself that one could see in a beloved’s eyes when up close. Petrarchan poets had explored the idea that a despairing wooer constructs his own version of his beloved inside his mind and loves that 2

construction more than he loves any woman out in the world around him. 3 bootes: avails. 4 duraunce: imprisonment. 5 aleggeaunce: alleviation, with a possible pun on the sense “presenting proof in court,” given that Timias cannot plead his case to Belphoebe. 6 The puns nicely convey Timias’ paradoxical state: his physical wound gathers (as its sides grow together) and becomes whole; his emotional wound gathers (becomes infected) and becomes a hole. 7 playsters: bandages. 8 I.e., from death’s clutches. 9 dew: due, appropriate. 10 hew: hue, complexion; appearance.

Canto Five

103

But when his meane estate he did revew, He from such hardy boldnesse was restraynd, And of his lucklesse lott and cruell love thus playnd. 45

“Unthankfull wretch” (said he) “is this the meed,1 With which her soverain mercy thou doest quight?2 Thy life she saved by her gratious deed, But thou doest weene with villeinous despight, To blott her honour, and her heavenly light. Dye rather, dye, then so disloyally Deeme of her high desert, or seeme so light:3 Fayre death it is to shonne more shame, to dy:4 Dye rather, dy, then ever love disloyally.

46

“But if to love disloyalty it bee,5 Shall I then hate her, that from deathes dore Me brought? ah farre be such reproch fro mee. What can I lesse doe, then her love therefore, Sith I her dew reward cannot restore: Dye rather, dye,6 and dying doe her serve, Dying her serve, and living her adore; Thy life she gave, thy life she doth deserve: Dye rather, dye, then ever from her service swerve.

1

meed: reward; repayment; Timias is speaking to himself. 2 quight: requite. Timias would not need to feel so guilty at loving her chastely without expectation of return; his guilt indicates that he is also having lustful thoughts. 3 I.e., to form such a disloyal opinion of— or such a disloyal expectation of—her lofty worthiness, or to seem so shallowminded. 4 I.e., it will be good for you (speaking to himself) to die if by doing so you avoid incurring still more shame. There are puns on both “dye” (common slang for “have an orgasm”) and “serve” (common slang for “service someone sexually”).

5

I.e., if it is disloyal to love. This contrived refrain is not necessarily a sign that the poem is asking its readers to consider Timias as more self-consciously artful than sincere. Sixteenth-century poets often used highly artificial language to convey the intense emotion attendant upon times of great stress or of great sincerity. Nor was this merely a poetic strategy; in his handbook for courtiers, Castiglione at times apparently leans toward the opinion that people who are noble in every sense of the word find it easy to learn how to speak nobly and can thus be recognized as noble through their easy but elegant manner of speaking. See Introduction, 1. 6

104

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

47

“But foolish boy, what bootes1 thy service bace To her, to whom the hevens doe serve and sew?2 Thou a meane Squyre, of meeke and lowly place,3 She hevenly borne, and of celestiall hew. How then? of all love taketh equall vew:4 And doth not highest God vouchsafe5 to take The love and service of the basest crew?6 If she will not, dye meekly for her sake; Dye rather, dye, then ever so faire love forsake.”

48

Thus warreid7 he long time against his will, Till that8 through weaknesse he was forst at last, To yield himselfe unto the mightie ill: Which as a victour proud, gan ransack fast His inward partes, and all his entrayles wast,9 That neither blood in face, nor life in hart It left, but both did quite drye up, and blast;10 As percing levin,11 which the inner part Of every thing consumes, and calcineth by art.12

49

Which seeing13 fayre Belphoebe, gan to feare, Least14 that his wound were inly well not heald, Or that the wicked steele empoysned were: Litle shee weend, that love he close conceald; Yet still he wasted, as the snow congeald, When the bright sunne his beams thereon doth beat; Yet never he his hart to her reveald, But rather chose to dye for sorow great, Then with dishonorable termes her to entreat.

1

8

2

9

bootes: avails, profits. sew: attend upon; take as a guide; court; apply to for favor. 3 meane: inferior; low; place: occupation; status. 4 I.e., love looks alike on everyone. 5 vouchsafe: grant. 6 crew: bunch; gang; mob. 7 warreid: warred.

Till that: until. wast: waste. 10 blast: wither. 11 levin: lightning. 12 calcineth by art: reduces to powder by alchemical means. 13 Imagine a comma here; Belphoebe is doing the seeing. 14 Least: lest.

Canto Five

50

She gracious Lady, yet no paines did spare, To doe him ease, or doe him remedy: Many Restoratives of vertues1 rare, And costly Cordialles2 she did apply, To mitigate his stubborne malady: But that sweet Cordiall, which can restore A love-sick hart, she did to him envy;3 To him, and to all th’unworthy world forlore4 She did envy that soveraine5 salve, in secret store.

51

That daintie Rose,6 the daughter of her Morne, More deare then life she tendered, whose flowre The girlond7 of her honour did adorne: Ne suffred she the Middayes scorching powre, Ne the sharp Northerne wind thereon to showre, But lapped up her silken leaves most chayre,8 When so the froward skye began to lowre;9 But soone as calmed was the christall ayre, She did it fayre dispred,10 and let to florish fayre.

1

vertues: healing qualities. Cordialles: restorative beverage, usually made by the lady of the house, consisting of sweetened spirits with or without herbs or other medicinal ingredients (sugar being itself thought medicinal). Etymologically, medicine that restores the heart. 3 envy: deny; begrudge. 4 forlore: miserable; forlorn. 5 soveraine: superlatively efficacious. 6 Rose: her chastity and/or her virginity. Clearly Spenser is using the character of Belphoebe to comment upon, and at least ostensibly to praise, the Virgin Queen. However, the stanza’s concrete descriptions tip the rose metaphor dangerously toward equating the rose neither with chastity nor virginity but with Belphoebe’s unbroken hymen. If the metaphor tips all the way in that direction, several of the stanza’s images become nothing short of bizarre. But with 2

105

or without the rose metaphor, Belphoebe’s denying Timias the one thing that would cure him is ambiguously represented: is she virtue personified, or is she cold-hearted and even selfish? In a world in which a barrage of parental lectures, sermons, pamphlets, books, letters, and passing remarks teach unmarried women that their highest aspiration to virtue consists of preserving their virginity until marriage, the question of whether Spenser is purely praising or partly condemning Belphoebe is not an easy one. Shakespeare recognized the moral dilemma when he wrote about Isabella, Claudio, and Angelo in Measure for Measure. 7 girlond: garland. 8 lapped: folded up; chayre: charily, carefully; frugally. 9 froward: uncooperative; inimical; lowre: lower, scowl—i.e., become overcast. 10 dispred: spread out; spread around.

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52

Eternall God in his almightie powre, To make ensample of his heavenly grace, In Paradize whylome did plant this flowre; Whence he it fetcht out of her native place, And did in stocke of earthly flesh enrace,1 That mortall men her glory should admyre: In gentle Ladies breste, and bounteous race Of woman kind it fayrest flowre doth spyre,2 And beareth fruit of honour and all chast desyre.

53

Fayre ympes3 of beautie, whose bright shining beames Adorne the world with like to heavenly light, And to your willes both royalties and Reames4 Subdew, through conquest of your wondrous might, With this fayre flowre your goodly girlonds dight, Of chastity and vertue virginall, That shall embellish more your beautie bright, And crowne your heades with heavenly coronall, Such as the Angels weare before Gods tribunall.

54

To youre faire selves a faire ensample frame,5 Of this faire virgin, this Belphebe fayre, To whom in perfect love, and spotlesse fame Of chastitie, none living6 may compayre: Ne poysnous Envy justly can empayre The prayse of her fresh flowring Maydenhead; For thy she standeth on the highest stayre7 Of th’honorable stage of womanhead, That Ladies all may follow her ensample dead.8

1

enrace: implant. spyre: put forth (as a plant puts forth spires of new growth). 3 ympes: offspring. 4 Reames: realms. 5 frame: fashion. 6 none living: Anderson argues that this phrase would tend to turn Belphoebe into a pure ideal rather than into a living example (56). The phrase is at least ambiguous, given 2

that Belphoebe is still living when the fictional action of the stanza is taking place and that Elizabeth is still living when Spenser writes these lines. 7 stayre: step; degree. 8 her ensample dead: her example after she is dead. Anderson points out that the phrase also conveys the ironic meaning “her lifeless example.” Again, the poem leaves open the possibility that Belphoebe’s flourishing chastity is cold and inhumane.

Canto Five

55

1

In so great prayse of stedfast chastity, Nathlesse she was so courteous and kynde, Tempred with grace, and goodly modesty, That seemed those two vertues strove to fynd The higher place in her Heroick mynd: So striving each did other more augment, And both encreast the prayse of woman kynde, And both encreast her beautie excellent; So all did make in her a perfect complement.1

complement: completion; fulfillment; consummation.

107

Canto Six The birth of fayre Belphoebe and Of Amorett is told. The Gardins of Adonis fraught1 With pleasures manifold.

1

Well may I weene, faire Ladies, all this while Ye wonder, how this noble Damozell2 So great perfections did in her compile, Sith that in salvage forests she did dwell, So farre from court and royall Citadell, The great schoolmaistresse of all courtesy:3 Seemeth4 that such wilde woodes should far expell All civile usage and gentility, And gentle sprite deforme with rude rusticity.

2

1

But to this faire Belphœbe in her berth5 The hevens so favorable were and free,6 Looking with myld aspect7 upon the earth, In th’Horoscope of her nativitee, That all the gifts of grace and chastitee On her they poured forth of plenteous horne;8

fraught: freighted, laden. The plural of “Gardins” emphasizes that the one garden described in this canto is closely tied to the many little gardens (or pots of quickly blooming flowers) grown by Greek followers of the Cult of Adonis. 2 I.e., Belphoebe. 3 great schoolmaistresse: the court, which was supposed to be the definition and origin of courtesy; courtesy: not only courtesy in the modern sense, but the whole panoply of good manners, talents, and virtues to which any knight, lord, or

lady serving at court was supposed to aspire. The lower classes were not usually considered capable of true courtesy, although humanists gestured toward the idea that education was as important as lineage in determining noble virtue. 4 Seemeth: it seems; it would seem. 5 berth: birth. 6 free: generous. 7 myld aspect: favorable astrological relationships. 8 plenteous horne: cornucopia, horn of plenty.

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Canto Six

109

Jove laught on Venus from his soverayne see,1 And Phœbus with faire beames did her adorne,2 And all the Graces rockt her cradle being borne. 3

Her berth was of the wombe of Morning dew,3 And her conception of the joyous Prime,4 And all her whole creation did her shew Pure and unspotted from all loathly crime, That is ingenerate in fleshly slime.5 So was this virgin borne, so was she bred, So was she trayned up from time to time,6 In all chaste vertue, and true bounti-hed Till to her dew perfection she was ripened.

4

Her mother was the faire Chrysogonee,7 The daughter of Amphisa,8 who by race A Faerie was, yborne of high degree, She bore Belphœbe, she bore in like cace9 Fayre Amoretta in the second place: These two were twinnes, and twixt them two did share The heritage of all celestiall grace. That all the rest it seemd they robbed bare Of bounty, and of beautie, and all vertues rare.

5

It were a goodly storie, to declare, By what straunge accident10 faire Chrysogone Conceiv’d these infants, and how them she bore, In this wilde forrest wandring all alone, After she had nine moneths fulfild and gone: For not as other wemens commune brood,

1

6

2

7

see: seat, throne. I.e., the planets were favorably aligned at her birth. 3

Cf. Ps. 110.3. Prime: springtime. 5 I.e., unlike all other mortals except for Jesus and his mother, Mary, Belphoebe is born without original sin—the general sin made inherent in the human race by Adam and Eve’s specific sin. 4

from time to time: continuously. Chrysogonee: Greek “golden-born.” The name links her with Danaë, a mythological character who conceived when Jove came to her in the form of a shower of gold. 8 Amphisa: Greek “of double nature.” 9 in like cace: by the same means; at the same (or much the same) time. 10

accident: chance.

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They were enwombed in the sacred throne Of her chaste bodie, nor with commune food, As other wemens babes, they sucked vitall blood.1 6

But wondrously they were begot, and bred Through influence of th’hevens fruitfull ray, As it in antique bookes is mentioned.2 It was upon a Sommers shinie day, When Titan3 faire his beames did display, In a fresh fountaine,4 far from all mens vew, She bath’d her brest, the boyling heat t’allay; She bath’d with roses red, and violets blew,5 And all the sweetest flowres, that in the forrest grew.

7

Till faint through yrkesome wearines, adowne Upon the grassy ground her selfe she layd To sleepe, the whiles a gentle slombring swowne Upon her fell all naked bare displayd; The sunbeames bright upon her body playd, Being through former bathing mollifide,6 And pierst into her wombe, where they embayd7 With so sweet sence8 and secret power unspide, That in her pregnant flesh they shortly fructifide.

1

Given that fetuses were believed to be nurtured by their mothers’ blood in the womb, these lines cannot be saying that unlike other fetuses, these sucked vital blood. Mothers’ milk was thought to be concocted from mothers’ blood, which thus differs from “vital” blood; yet it is difficult to believe that Spenser wants us to imagine the two newborn babies sucking blood at their comatose mother’s breast, especially since their birth has yet to be described. Zurcher has argued persuasively that lines 5.6–9 are a précis of the rest of the canto, in which we learn that the babies are nursed in an uncommon manner––by nymphs––and that Amoret is reared in a garden that contains decidedly uncommon means of nourishment for babies. Commenting upon Spenser’s discomfort with the pregnant body, Adelman observes that his giving

Belphoebe and Amoret a miraculous form of nursing is “giving back with one hand what he has just taken away with the other, i.e., the miraculousness of conception even by ordinary means.” 2 Although Chrysogone is Spenser’s invention, “antique books” do, of course, mention other cases of conception by divine influence. But the phrase is intended to give a transparently fictional authority to Spenser’s story. 3 Titan: the sun god. 4 fountaine: spring. 5 In the language of flowers, roses represented romantic love; violets represented virginity. 6 mollifide: softened; made receptive. 7 embayd: steeped. 8 sence: sensation.

Canto Six

8

Miraculous may seeme to him,1 that reades So straunge ensample of conception, But reason teacheth that the fruitfull seades Of all things living, through impression Of the sunbeames in moyst complexion,2 Doe life conceive and quickned are by kynd:3 So after Nilus inundation, Infinite shapes4 of creatures men doe fynd, Informed5 in the mud, on which the Sunne hath shynd.

9

Great father he of generation Is rightly cald, th’authour of life and light; And his faire sister6 for creation Ministreth matter fit, which tempred right With heate and humour,7 breedes the living wight. So sprong these twinnes in wombe of Chrysogone, Yet wist she nought thereof, but sore affright, Wondred to see her belly so upblone, Which still8 increast, till she her terme had full outgone.

1

him: i.e., anyone. I.e., when the woman’s body is primarily of a moist humor. Every body was believed to be made up of four humors—blood, black bile, yellow bile, and phlegm—the balance of which determined the person’s physical and mental constitution. Each of the humors corresponded to one of the four elements and had its properties; phlegm corresponded to water and was moist. In general, women were primarily cold and moist, which made them both fruitful and less able than men to think or act vigorously. Even their fruitfulness was of a phlegmatic sort, being that of a receptive earth in which men planted their active seed. Women’s wombs were usually thought of as containers, not creators of life (though see 47.8.n.). Spenser underscores this idea by having Chrysogone actually asleep both when she conceives and when she gives birth (stanza 27)—and by comparing her body at conception to the riparian

2

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zone of the Nile River when the annual flood has left it moist. There had long been a belief that the Nile and the sun could combine forces to generate living creatures from earth; see, e.g., Metamorphoses, 1.416–29, in which Ovid compares the fertile mud left by the receding Nile after a flood to the moist fertility of a woman’s uterus. Cf. FQ I.i.21 and III.vi.35. See also III.ix.6.9.n. 3 quickned are by kynd: are brought to life naturally; are brought to life according to their species. 4 Infinite shapes: cf. the infinite shapes in the Garden of Adonis (vi.35) and in Alma’s brain (II.ix.50). 5 Informed: formed inside. 6 sister: the moon, thought to influence women’s wombs. 7 humour: moisture. 8 still: constantly.

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10

Whereof conceiving1 shame and foule disgrace, Albe2 her guiltlesse conscience her cleard, She fled into the wildernesse a space, Till that unweeldy burden she had reard,3 And shund dishonor, which as death she feard: Where wearie of long traveill, downe to rest Her selfe she set, and comfortably cheard; There a sad cloud of sleepe her overkest,4 And seized every sence with sorrow sore opprest.

11

It fortuned, faire Venus having lost Her little sonne, the winged god of love,5 Who for some light displeasure, which him crost, Was from her fled, as flit as ayery Dove,6 And left her blisfull bowre of joy above, (So from her often he had fled away, When she for ought him sharpely did reprove, And wandred in the world in straunge aray, Disguiz’d in thousand shapes, that none might him bewray.)

12

Him for to seeke, she left her heavenly hous, The house of goodly formes and faire aspects,7 Whence all the world derives the glorious Features of beautie, and all shapes select, With which high God his workmanship hath deckt; And searched everie way, through which his wings Had borne him, or his tract8 she mote detect: She promist kisses sweet, and sweeter things, Unto the man, that of him tydings to her brings.

13

First she him sought in Court, where most he us’d Whylome to haunt, but there she found him not; But many there she found, which sore accus’d His falshood, and with fowle infamous blot

1

The pun is obvious. Albe: although. 3 reard: brought forth. 4 overkest: overcast. 5 Inspired by Moschus’ second-century BCE poem Eros drapetes, many Renaissance authors wrote about Venus searching through the forest for Cupid. 2

6

flit: fleet; inconstant; Dove: a bird associated with Venus. 7 formes: the shapes given to chaotic matter; aspects: astrological positions of the planet Venus. See 47.8.n. for a discussion of Venus’ relationship to heavenly forms. 8 tract: trace; track.

Canto Six

113

His cruell deedes and wicked wyles did spot:1 Ladies and Lordes she every where mote heare Complayning, how with his empoysned shot Their wofull harts he wounded had whyleare,2 And so had left them languishing twixt hope and feare. 14

She then the Cities sought from gate to gate, And everie one did aske, did he him see; And everie one her answerd, that too late3 He had him seene, and felt the crueltee Of his sharpe dartes and whot artilleree;4 And every one threw forth reproches rife Of his mischievous deedes, and sayd, That hee Was the disturber of all civill life, The enimy of peace, and authour of all strife.

15

Then in the countrey she abroad5 him sought, And in the rurall cottages inquir’d, Where also many plaintes to her were brought, How he their heedelesse harts with love had fir’d, And his false venim through their veines inspir’d;6 And eke the gentle Shepheard swaynes,7 which sat Keeping their fleecy flockes, as they were hyr’d, She sweetly heard complaine, both how and what Her sonne had to them doen; yet she did smile thereat.

16

But when in none of all these she him got, She gan avize, where els he mote him hyde: At last she her bethought, that she had not Yet sought the salvage woods and forests wyde, In which full many lovely Nymphes abyde, Mongst whom might be, that he did closely8 lye, Or that the love of some of them him tyde: For thy she thether cast9 her course t’apply, To search the secret haunts of Dianes company.

1

spot: besmirch; vilify. whyleare: erewhile, some time previously. 3 I.e., too late to take evasive action. 4 whot artilleree: hot weapons. 5 abroad: widely; out in the open air. 2

6

inspir’d: breathed. swaynes: country workers; country lovers. 8 closely: covertly. 9 cast: resolved. 7

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17

Shortly unto the wastefull1 woods she came, Whereas she found the Goddesse with her crew, After late chace of their embrewed2 game, Sitting beside a fountaine in a rew,3 Some of them washing with the liquid dew From off their dainty limbs the dusty sweat, And soyle which did deforme their lively hew,4 Others lay shaded from the scorching heat; The rest upon her person gave attendance great.

18

She having hong upon a bough on high Her bow and painted quiver, had unlaste Her silver buskins5 from her nimble thigh, And her lanck loynes ungirt, and brests unbraste,6 After her heat the breathing cold to taste; Her golden lockes, that late in tresses bright Embreaded7 were for hindring of her haste, Now loose about her shoulders hong undight, And were with sweet Ambrosia8 all besprinckled light.

19

Soone as she Venus saw behinde her backe, She was asham’d to be so loose surpriz’d, And woxe halfe wroth against her damzels slacke, That had not her thereof before aviz’d, But suffred her so carelesly disguiz’d9 Be overtaken. Soone her garments loose Upgath’ring, in her bosome she compriz’d,10 Well as she might, and to the Goddesse rose, Whiles all her Nymphes did like a girlond her enclose.11

1

wastefull: deserted. embrewed: soaked in blood. 3 fountaine: spring; rew: row. 4 deforme: disfigure; hew: countenances. 5 buskins: boots. 6 lanck loynes: slim hips; unbraste: unbraced, loosened from clothing. 7 Embreaded: braided. 2

8

Ambrosia: a perfume worn only by the gods. 9 suffred: allowed; disguiz’d: unclothed. 10 compriz’d: gathered together. 11 Spenser’s garlands are worth examining. Cf. I.ii.37, I.vii.4, I.x.54, ii.2, iv.17, v.51, vi.43, IV.i.24, VI.ix.8, VI.ix.43, and VI.x.12, just for starters.

Canto Six

115

20

Goodly she gan faire Cytherea1 greet, And shortly2 asked her, what cause her brought Into that wildernesse for her unmeet, From her sweete bowres, and beds with pleasures fraught: That suddein chaung she straung adventure3 thought. To whom halfe weeping, she thus answered, That she her dearest sonne Cupido sought, Who in his frowardnes from her was fled; That she repented sore, to have him angered.

21

Thereat Diana gan to smile, in scorne Of her vaine playnt, and to her scoffing sayd; “Great pitty sure, that ye be so forlorne4 Of your gay sonne, that gives ye so good ayd To your disports: ill mote ye bene apayd,”5 But she was more engrieved, and replide; “Faire sister, ill beseemes it to upbrayd A dolefull heart with so disdainfull pride; The like that mine, may be your paine another tide.6

22

“As you in woods and wanton7 wildernesse Your glory sett, to chace the salvage beasts, So my delight is all in joyfulnesse, In beds, in bowres, in banckets,8 and in feasts: And ill becomes you with your lofty creasts,9 To scorne the joy, that Jove is glad to seeke; We both are bownd to follow heavens beheasts, And tend our charges with obeisaunce meeke: Spare, gentle sister, with reproch my paine to eeke.10

23

“And tell me, if that ye my sonne have heard, To lurke emongst your Nimphes in secret wize;11 Or keepe their cabins: much I am affeard,

1 Goodly: courteously; Cytherea: another name for Venus, who was born from the sea off the island of Cythera. 2 shortly: quickly; curtly. 3 adventure: chance. 4 forlorne: bereft. 5 I.e., your son helps you in your bad sport (of infecting people with painful love); may you be repaid with similar unhappiness.

6

I.e., the pain that I am feeling may at another time be what you feel. 7 wanton: undisciplined, wild—but with an ironic pun on the meaning “unchaste.” 8 banckets: banquets; special-occasion meals of sweets. 9 creasts: helmets; crests on a helmet. 10 eeke: increase. 11 wize: manner.

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Least1 he like one of them him selfe disguize, And turne his arrowes to their exercize:2 So may he long him selfe full easie3 hide: For he is faire and fresh in face and guize,4 As any Nimphe (let not it be envide.)” So saying every Nimph full narrowly shee eide. 24

But Phœbe therewith sore was angered, And sharply saide, “Goe Dame, goe seeke your boy, Where you him lately lefte, in Mars his5 bed; He comes not here, we scorne his foolish joy, Ne lend we leisure to his idle toy:6 But if I catch him in this company, By Stygian lake I vow, whose sad annoy7 The Gods doe dread, he dearly shall abye:8 Ile clip his wanton9 wings, that he no more shall flye.”

25

Whom whenas Venus saw so sore displeasd, Shee inly10 sory was, and gan relent, What shee had said: so her she soone appeasd, With sugred words and gentle blandishment, From which a fountaine from her sweete lips went, And welled goodly forth, that in short space She11 was well pleasd, and forth her damzells sent Through all the woods, to search from place to place, If any tract12 of him or tidings they mote trace.

26

To search13 the God of love her Nimphes she sent, Throughout the wandring forest every where: And after them her selfe eke with her went

1

Least: lest. I.e., he may disguise himself as one of them and go hunting with them, or he may disguise himself as one of them and hunt them with his arrows (which would make them turn away from Diana’s chaste rules). 3 full easie: quite easily. 4 guize: appearance. 5 Mars his: Mars’. 6 toy: game; foolishness. 2

7

Stygian: of the river Styx, in hell. Even the gods regarded oaths taken upon Styx as sacrosanct; sad annoy: serious annoyance. 8 abye: pay the penalty. 9 wanton: undisciplined, with pun on “unchaste.” 10 inly: inwardly. 11 She: Diana. 12 tract: trace, track. 13 search: search for.

Canto Six

117

To seeke the fugitive.1 So long they sought, till they arrived were In that same shady covert, whereas lay Faire Crysogone in slombry traunce whilere:2 Who in her sleepe (a wondrous thing to say) Unwares had borne two babes, as faire as springing3 day. 27

Unwares she them conceivd, unwares she bore: She bore withouten paine, that she conceiv’d Withouten pleasure: ne her need implore Lucinaes4 aide: which when they both perceiv’d, They were through wonder nigh of sence berev’d, And gazing each on other, nought bespake: At last they both agreed, her seeming griev’d Out of her heavie swowne not to awake, But from her loving side5 the tender babes to take.

28

Up they them tooke, eachone a babe uptooke, And with them carried, to be fostered; Dame Phœbe to a Nymphe her babe betooke,6 To be upbrought in perfect Maydenhed, And of her selfe her name Belphœbe red: But Venus hers thence far away convayd, To be upbrought in goodly womanhed, And in her litle loves stead, which was strayd, Her Amoretta7 cald, to comfort her dismayd.

1

This line is incomplete in the 1590 edition; for the 1596 edition, Spenser emended the line to read, “To seeke the fugitive, both farre and nere.” 2 whilere: a while previously. 3 springing: dawning. 4 Lucinaes: a name applied both to Diana and to Juno, each in her role as the protector of women in labor. 5 loving side: as Hamilton explains in his note, the fact that “side” could mean “womb” suggests that Diana and Venus either take the babies from beside Chrysogone or that they help her complete the delivery (Hamilton, FQ III.vi.27.9.n.). Gross argues that the words “loving side” take the love that Chrysogone will never be able to give her children and transfer it to

her unfeeling side in the very moment in which the babies are taken from her. 6 betooke: gave to care for. Quitslund points out that English attitudes toward wet nursing are relevant to this passage (2006). It was the practice among those who could afford it to give a baby to a wet nurse until it was weaned. Despite the ubiquity of this practice, anxieties surrounded the choice of a wet nurse, since it was believed that she could harm the child not only by taking insufficient care of it but also by transferring her character to it through her milk. In A View of the Present State of Ireland, Spenser discusses the evils of the English in Ireland taking on Irish wet nurses (View, 67–8). 7 Amoretta: from the Italian “amoretto,” meaning “little love.”

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29

Shee brought her to her joyous Paradize, Wher most she wonnes, when she on earth does dwell. So faire a place, as Nature can devize: Whether in Paphos, or Cytheron hill, Or it in Gnidus1 bee, I wote not well; But well I wote by triall,2 that this same All other pleasaunt places doth excell, And called is by her lost lovers name, The Gardin of Adonis, far renowmd by fame.3

30

In that same Gardin all the goodly flowres, Wherewith dame Nature doth her beautify, And decks the girlonds of her Paramoures, Are fetcht: there is the first seminary4 Of all things, that are borne to live and dye, According to their kynds. Long worke it were,5 Here to account6 the endlesse progeny Of all the weeds,7 that bud and blossome there; But so much as doth need, must needs be counted here.8

31

It sited9 was in fruitfull soyle of old, And girt10 in with two walls on either side; The one of yron, the other of bright gold, That none might thorough breake, nor over-stride: And double gates it had, which opened wide, By which both in and out men moten pas;

1

Paphos, Gnidus, and Cytheron Hill were places in Cyprus and Greece that were supposed to have worshipped Venus (as Aphrodite). Cytheron Hill may be either the island of Cythera or Mount Cytheron. 2 triall: experience. Of love? Of sexual dalliance? Of life (given that the Garden of Adonis is the source of life)? 3 In ancient Greece, devotees of the cult of Adonis grew forcing gardens of herbs in pots; these were called Gardens of Adonis and symbolized both ephemerality and cyclical life. However, the idea that a larger Garden of Adonis is the source of all life and the home of Venus and Adonis is

Spenser’s invention. See i.34.5.n. for the most common versions of their story. 4 seminary: seed bed. 5 kynds: natural types; species; it were: it would be. 6 to account: to recount. 7 weeds: plants—though in other contexts, the word could also have its modern meaning of “undesirable plants,” and this meaning may press ironically upon the text here. 8 I.e., but this poem must recount as many of these progeny here as are necessary to recount. 9 sited: situated; placed (on a site). 10 girt: girded, encircled.

Canto Six

119

Th’one1 faire and fresh, the other old and dride: Old Genius the porter of them was, Old Genius, the which a double nature has.2 32

He letteth in, he letteth out to wend,3 All that to come into the world desire; A thousand thousand naked babes4 attend About him day and night, which doe require, That he with fleshly weeds5 would them attire: Such as him list, such as eternall fate Ordained hath, he clothes with sinfull mire,6 And sendeth forth7 to live in mortall state, Till they agayn returne backe by the hinder8 gate.

33

After that they againe retourned beene, They in that Gardin planted bee agayne; And grow afresh, as they had never seene Fleshly corruption, nor mortall payne. Some thousand yeares so doen they there remayne, And then of him are clad with other hew,9 Or10 sent into the chaungefull world agayne, Till thether they retourne, where first they grew: So like a wheele arownd they ronne from old to new.11

1

Th’one: i.e., the one gate. Genius is the god of birth and death, sending people out into the world and bringing them back to the garden of generation and regeneration. 3 wend: travel; betake oneself to something different; depart; turn from one condition or form to another; perish. Genius’ nature is beautifully encapsulated in this one word; he is the porter of a garden that, in being the source of mortal life, must also in some sense be the source of death. 4 naked babes: it is not certain exactly what these naked babes represent. They may be souls before they are born into earthly bodies; tiny people (homunculi) that exist in semen and can grow into fetuses in women’s wombs; or what Spenser calls “substaunces” in stanzas 36 and 37. In one 2

sense, Amoret is one of these babes, raised in the garden. 5 weeds: clothing—and by metaphorical extension, the bodies that clothe souls when they enter the world. 6 mire: mud—and by metaphorical extension, the earthly bodies that souls must inhabit for a time, despite those bodies’ infection with original sin. 7 I.e., forth from the garden, into the mortal world. 8 hinder: back, rear. 9 hew: appearance; fleshly form. 10 Or: one would expect “and” here. 11 The Garden of Adonis facilitates the transmigration of souls—or at least the generative and formative parts of the souls—from one earthly body to another,

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34

Ne needs there Gardiner to sett, or sow, To plant or prune: for of their owne accord All things, as they created were, doe grow, And yet remember well the mighty word, Which first was spoken by th’Almighty lord, That bad them to increase and multiply: Ne doe they need with water of the ford, Or of the clouds to moysten their roots dry; For in themselves eternall moisture they imply.1

35

Infinite shapes2 of creatures there are bred, And uncouth3 formes, which none yet ever knew, And every sort is in a sondry4 bed Sett by it selfe, and ranckt in comely rew:5 Some fitt for reasonable sowles6 t’indew, Some made for beasts, some made for birds to weare,

with a thousand years between (see Quitslund, 201–2). At the same time, the Garden represents the idea of eternity in mutability, a notion to which Spenser’s poetry returns time and again. The standard version of this philosophy comes most directly from De consolatione philosophiae (The Consolation of Philosophy), by the neoplatonic Roman philosopher Boethius, who lived in the late fifth and early sixth century CE. Boethius argues that whereas everything on earth is impermanent, corruptible, and fleeting, the larger picture seen by God is that all change occurs in cyclical patterns, which themselves do not change and thus form part of the eternal, divine plan. In neoplatonist philosophy, “form” designates a perfect, transcendent idea of which earthly matter is only an imperfect representation. Yet in Spenser’s version, surprisingly, forms change while matter remains eternal. Spenser is not simply reversing the usual terminology, since for him, “forms” are both the heavenly forms that come from Venus and the outward, visible shapes that descend from those heavenly forms—the shapes given to lumps of matter before those lumps are endowed with souls. Spenser’s version becomes more abstract

and comprehensive in the “Cantos of Mutabilitie,” with which The Faerie Queene ends; those cantos argue that all things work toward a larger perfection in the eternal plan, even while seeming to waver and decay when viewed by mortals, who are confined to earthly time. 1 imply: enclose. 2 Infinite shapes: see also the analogy between Chrysogone’s fertility and the Nile’s ability to generate infinite shapes when warmed by the sun (st.8), the infinite shapes in Alma’s brain (II.ix.50), and the comparison of Errour’s spawn to “Ten thousand kindes of creatures” bred by the Nile (I.i.21). 3 uncouth: strange. 4 sondry: different—i.e., each species in its own bed. 5 rew: row. 6 reasonable sowles: souls of reasoning creatures. Plants had vegetable souls, capable only of reproducing, nourishing, and growing. Animals had sensible souls, which could do the above and also perceive and desire. Only humans had souls that could reason.

Canto Six

121

And all the fruitfull spawne of fishes hew1 In endlesse rancks along enraunged were, That seemd the Ocean could not containe them there. 36

Daily they grow, and daily forth are sent Into the world, it to replenish more, Yet is the stocke not lessened, nor spent, But still2 remaines in everlasting store, As it at first created was of yore. For in the wide wombe of the world there lyes, In hatefull darknes and in deepe horrore, An huge eternal Chaos, which supplyes The substaunces3 of natures fruitfull progenyes.

37

All things from thence doe their first being fetch, And borrow matter, whereof they are made, Which whenas forme and feature it does ketch,4 Becomes a body, and doth then invade The state of life, out of the griesly shade. That substaunce is eterne, and bideth5 so, Ne when the life decayes, and forme does fade, Doth it consume,6 and into nothing goe, But chaunged is, and often altred to and froe.

38

The substaunce is not chaungd, nor altered, But th’only forme and outward fashion;7 For every substaunce is conditioned To chaunge her hew,8 and sondry formes to don Meet for her temper and complexion: For formes are variable and decay, By course of kinde,9 and by occasion; And that faire flowre of beautie fades away, As doth the lilly fresh before the sunny ray.

1

hew: fleshly form. still: always. 3 substaunces: matter that does not yet have form. How the products of Chaos differ from those of the Garden is an interpretive issue. 4 ketch: catch, take. 5 bideth: remains. 2

6 I.e., nor is the substance consumed when life leaves it. 7 I.e., the matter does not change, though its form and appearance do change. 8 her hew: the substance’s form and appearance. 9 kinde: nature; species.

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39

Great enimy to it, and to all the rest, That in the Gardin of Adonis springs, Is wicked Tyme, who with his scyth addrest,1 Does mow the flowring herbes2 and goodly things, And all their glory to the ground downe flings, Where they do wither, and are fowly mard:3 He flyes about, and with his flaggy4 winges Beates downe both leaves and buds without regard, Ne ever pitty may relent5 his malice hard.

40

Yet pitty often did the gods relent, To see so faire thinges mard, and spoiled quight: And their great mother Venus did lament The losse of her deare brood, her deare delight: Her hart was pierst with pitty at the sight, When walking through the Gardin, them she spyde, Yet no’te6 she find redresse for such despight: For all that lives, is subject to that law: All things decay in time, and to their end doe draw.7

41

But were it not, that Time their troubler is, All that in this delightfull Gardin growes, Should happy bee, and have immortall blis: For here all plenty, and all pleasure flowes, And sweete love gentle fitts8 emongst them throwes, Without fell rancor, or fond gealosy;

1 Tyme: Time, here conventionally personified as a man with a scythe; addrest: made ready; aimed. The presence of Time makes it clear that Spenser is not thinking of the Garden of Adonis as having heavenly perfection or even Edenic immortality. Time may at first seem out of place, but in fact the entire description of the Garden has emphasized time: in time, each substance takes a form, and in time, each form grows until it is ready to leave the Garden. The eternity of the Garden consists of the Garden’s persistent use and reuse of the same matter, rather than of its being protected from change. Nonetheless, the destructive

figure of Time is designed to take us by surprise. 2 herbes: any nonwoody green plants. 3 mard: marred. 4 flaggy: drooping. 5 relent: cause to relent. 6 no’te: could not; did not know how to. 7 In the Cantos of Mutabilitie, Spenser develops an answer to this apparent dilemma: that individual beings die precisely in order to bring their species to perfection, in a larger pattern that is eternal. 8 fitts: i.e., fits of amorous desire.

Canto Six

123

Franckly each Paramor his leman knowes,1 Each bird his mate, ne any does envy Their goodly meriment, and gay felicity. 42

There is continuall Spring, and harvest there Continuall, both meeting at one tyme:2 For both the boughes doe laughing blossoms beare, And with fresh colours decke the wanton Pryme,3 And eke attonce the heavenly trees they clyme, Which seeme to labour under their fruites lode: The whiles the joyous birdes make their pastyme Emongst the shady leaves, their sweet abode, And their trew loves without suspition tell abrode.4

43

Right in the middest of that Paradise, There stood a stately Mount,5 on whose round top A gloomy grove of mirtle trees did rise, Whose shady boughes sharpe steele did never lop,6 Nor wicked beastes their tender buds did crop, But like a girlond compassed7 the hight, And from their fruitfull sydes sweet gum did drop, That all the ground with pretious deaw bedight, Threw forth most dainty odours, and most sweet delight.

44

And in the thickest covert of that shade, There was a pleasaunt Arber, not by art, But of the trees owne inclination made,8

1 I.e., each wooer freely and openly has sexual intercourse with his beloved. 2 Descriptions of the mythical Golden Age frequently included descriptions of springtime and harvest lasting year-round—an especially attractive vision in cultures in which most preserved food was tough and salty, and in which a poor harvest could lead to winter famine. 3 Pryme: springtime. 4 tell: declare or reveal; abrode: out in the open air; all around. 5 Mount: in describing the hill on which Venus and Adonis lie with each other, Spenser could expect his readers to know that mons veneris was Latin for “Mount of

Venus,” the anatomical term for the haircovered protuberance in the center of a woman’s pubis. Succeeding lines reinforce the allegorical image with its description of a circle of trees that drop sweet gum and provide sweet delight. 6 lop: prune; cut down. 7 compassed: encircled. 8 inclination: physical leaning; natural disposition. The absence of art distinguishes this arbor from the highly artificial Bower of Bliss (II.v.29; II.xii.42–77). It is well to remember, however, that English Romanticism would not be invented for another two hundred years. The English Renaissance celebrated artifice (the skilled work of human hands) at least as much as it vilified

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Which knitting their rancke1 braunches part to part, With wanton yvie twyne entrayld athwart,2 And Eglantine, and Caprifole3 emong, Fashiond above within their4 inmost part, That nether Phœbus5 beams could through them throng, Nor Aeolus 6 sharp blast could worke them any wrong. 45

And all about grew every sort of flowre, To which sad lovers were transformde of yore; Fresh Hyacinthus, Phœbus paramoure,7 Foolish Narcisse, that likes the watry shore,8 Sad Amaranthus, made a flowre but late,9 Sad Amaranthus, in whose purple gore Me seemes I see Amintas10 wretched fate, To whom sweet Poets verse hath given endlesse date.11

its opposition to nature, and untamed nature was still most likely to be associated with wild incivility or bestiality. Here, Venus’ Mount has the best of both conditions: the trees have not been pruned and trained, but they look as if they had been. Their natural growth habit weaves a bower for the lovers’ comfort. 1 rancke: profusely growing. 2 yvie twyne entrayld athwart: ivy vine entwined across. 3 Caprifole: honeysuckle. 4 their: the trees’. 5 Phœbus: the sun’s. 6 Aeolus: the wind’s. 7 Hyacinthus: a young man who was beloved of Phoebus Apollo. Zephyrus, the west wind, also fancied Hyacinthus and became jealous. When Apollo and Hyacinthus were throwing the discus, Zephyrus hurled the discus back at the youth’s head, killing him. After trying vainly to bring his beloved back to life, Apollo noticed that the youth’s head drooped on his neck like a broken flower. Apollo made a hyacinth flower spring from Hyacinthus’ blood, and on the petals Apollo inscribed the letters “AI, AI,” representing the sound of a mourner wailing (Ovid, Metamorphoses,

10.162–219, where Hyacinthus is also called Amyclides). 8 Narcisse: At age sixteen, Narcissus was too proud to return anyone’s love; he fled from the nymph Echo, who could show her love only by repeating what he said to her. A curse pronounced upon him by a rejected young man came true: Narcissus fell in love with his own reflection in a spring and stayed there, attempting to clasp his own image, until he died from hunger. Even in the underworld, he continued to gaze at his image in the Stygian waters. On earth, his body disappeared and a narcissus flower took its place (Metamorphoses, 3.339–510). 9 Amaranthus: an imaginary flower that never fades; its name means “unfading” in Greek and is the same word used to describe an unfading crown of glory in 1 Pet. 5.4—but see next note; but late: only recently. 10 Amintas: probably refers to Spenser’s friend Sir Philip Sidney, who had recently died at a young age, of a war wound. A contemporary poem describes Amintas as pining away for love of Phyllis and subsequently being changed into the purple amaranthus flower (Fraunce, Lamentations). 11 endlesse date: endless term of life; eternal life. Note the eight-line stanza.

Canto Six

46

There wont fayre Venus often to enjoy1 Her deare Adonis joyous company, And reape sweet pleasure of the wanton boy: There yet, some say, in secret he does ly, Lapped in flowres and pretious spycery,2 By her hid from the world, and from the skill3 Of Stygian Gods,4 which doe her love envy; But she her selfe, when ever that she will, Possesseth him, and of his sweetnesse takes her fill.5

47

And sooth it seemes they say:6 for he may not For ever dye, and ever buried bee In balefull night, where all thinges are forgot; All be he7 subject to mortalitie, Yet is eterne8 in mutabilitie, And by succession made perpetuall, Transformed oft, and chaunged diverslie: For him the Father of all formes they call;9 Therefore needs mote he live, that living gives to all.

48

There now he liveth in eternall blis, Joying his goddesse, and of her enjoyd: Ne feareth he henceforth that foe of his,

1

wont: used; enjoy: have sex with. spycery: spices, associated with luxury since many of them were expensive imported products. 3 skill: knowledge. 4 Stygian Gods: gods of the underworld. See i.34.5.n. for their claim on Adonis. 5 Possesseth: takes sexually; takes her fill: at least two puns are obvious, depending upon whether one is thinking of intercourse or of oral sex. 6 I.e., what they say seems true. 7 All be he: although he is; even if he is. 8 eterne: eternal. See 33.9.n. 9 Stanza 12.1–4 would seem to identify Venus as the originator of forms, while this stanza declares, in apparent contradiction, that Adonis is the originator of forms. As 2

125

Miller writes, medieval allegorists such as Bernard Silvestris posited “a continuity between the descent of forms from heaven and their transmission in the work of generation. A phallic Adonis might still be the Father of all generated or embodied forms without being their absolute origin; they may descend to him from a heavenly source associated with Venus” (2006). By aligning the female with transcendent form while aligning the male with its earthly embodiment, this allegory inverts the common Renaissance belief that women were more earthbound than men, less cerebral, and less given to abstract thought. One theory about male and female roles in generation was that the man gave life to the fetus, whereas the woman contributed only matter. Another was that both partners contributed seed, which contained spirit.

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Which with his cruell tuske him deadly cloyd:1 For that wilde Bore, the which him once annoyd,2 She firmely hath emprisoned for ay,3 That her sweet love his malice mote4 avoyd, In a strong rocky Cave, which is they say, Hewen underneath that Mount, that none him losen may.5 49

There now he lives in everlasting joy, With many of the Gods in company, Which thether haunt, and with the winged boy6 Sporting him selfe in safe felicity: Who when he hath with spoiles and cruelty Ransackt the world, and in the wofull harts Of many wretches set his triumphes hye, Thether resortes, and laying his sad dartes Asyde, with faire Adonis playes his wanton partes.7

50

And his trew love faire Psyche8 with him playes, Fayre Psyche to him lately reconcyld,

1 cloyd: gored, with obviously sexual imagery. 2 annoyd: injured. 3 for ay: for always. 4 mote: might. 5 The image of the furious boar imprisoned in a cave beneath Venus’ Mount (or mons veneris) lends itself to various interpretations: is Venus keeping a threatening aspect of Adonis’ phallic power in check, imprisoning his sexual energy so that she may enjoy it whenever she wishes, reining in her own dangerous desires, causing him to fear her controlling sexuality, convincing herself that her transgressive desires are actually his, or participating in a tableau that allegorizes the violence lurking beneath ordinary sex acts? No matter which interpretation we choose, our experience of this passage is unsettled by our knowledge that several other imprisoned monsters in the poem manage to break loose or otherwise threaten peace after apparently being conquered.

6

haunt: frequent; spend time; winged boy: Cupid. 7 Like many Renaissance authors, Spenser seems to have been fascinated with homoerotics even while constructing heteronormative fictional worlds. See Introduction, 5e. 8 Psyche: The Algerian-born author Apuleius, who lived in the second century CE, tells the story of Cupid and Psyche in his Metamorphoses seu de Asino Aureo (The Golden Ass). The princess Psyche was so beautiful that people confused her with Venus, which angered Venus so much that she told her son, Cupid, to wound Psyche with an arrow. An oracle said that Psyche’s future husband was a serpent and that she must put on mourning and go to a mountaintop for her funereal marriage. On the mountain, a breeze carried her into a paradisiacal valley where she was surrounded by luxuries and visited each night by a husband whom she could not see in the dark. Her jealous sisters convinced her that her hus-

Canto Six

127

After long troubles and unmeet upbrayes,1 With which his mother Venus her revyld, And eke himselfe her cruelly exyld: But now in stedfast love and happy state She with him lives, and hath him borne a chyld, Pleasure, that doth both gods and men aggrate,2 Pleasure, the daughter of Cupid and Psyche late.3 51

Hether great Venus brought this infant4 fayre, The yonger daughter of Chrysogonee, And unto Psyche with great trust and care Committed her, yfostered to bee, And trained up in trew feminitee: Who no lesse carefully her tendered, Then her owne daughter Pleasure, to whom shee Made her companion, and her lessoned5 In all the lore6 of love, and goodly womanhead.

52

In which when she to perfect ripenes7 grew, Of grace and beautie noble Paragone, She brought her forth into the worldes vew, To be th’ensample of true love alone,8 And Lodestarre9 of all chaste affection, To all fayre Ladies, that doe live on grownd.10

band was a monstrous snake, whereupon she lay in wait for him with a knife and a lamp. In the lamplight she saw that he was the glorious Cupid, but when a drop of lamp oil burned his shoulder and woke him up, he flew away. Psyche spent the rest of her earthly life searching for Cupid and performing unpleasant tasks set by the angry Venus. Cupid begged Jupiter to help Psyche, whereupon the gods gave her a cup of nectar to make her immortal so that she and Cupid could live together. Psyche gave birth to a child named Voluptas, meaning pleasure (especially sensual pleasure). Spenser may have read only Boccaccio’s translation of the story, in which Boccaccio

allegorizes Psyche as the Soul, which must endure trials before attaining eternal joy. 1 upbrayes: upbraidings. 2 aggrate: please, gratify. 3 late: recently (born). 4 this infant: Amoret. 5 lessoned: instructed. 6 lore: doctrine; advice; body of knowledge. 7 ripenes: maturity. 8 I.e., the only example of true love. 9 Lodestarre: guiding star; cynosure. 10 on grownd: on earth.

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To Faery court she came, where many one Admyrd her goodly haveour,1 and fownd His feeble hart wide launched with loves cruel wownd.2 53

But she to none of them her love did cast, Save to the noble knight Sir Scudamore,3 To whom her loving hart she linked fast In faithfull love, t’abide for evermore, And for his dearest sake endured sore, Sore trouble of an hainous enimy, Who her would forced have to have forlore4 Her former love, and stedfast loialty, As ye may elswhere reade that ruefull history.5

54

But well I weene, ye first desire to learne, What end unto that fearefull Damozell,6 Which fledd so fast from that same foster stearne,7 Whom with his brethren Timias slew, befell:8 That was to weet,9 the goodly Florimell, Who wandring for to seeke her lover deare, Her lover deare, her dearest Marinell, Into misfortune fell, as ye did heare, And from Prince Arthure fled with wings of idle feare.10

1

haveour: deportment (originally “possession,” then “self-possession”). 2 launched: lanced, pricked; wownd: wound. 3 Sir Scudamore: Italian scudo (shield) and amore (love). His name ends where Amoret’s begins. 4 forlore: forsaken. 5 Scudamore’s part in the narrative will get fully underway at xi.7.

6

fearefull Damozell: Florimell, last seen at iv.51. 7 foster stearne: cruel forester (see i.17). 8 Timias killed the Forester and his two brothers at v.15–25; befell: i.e., “what end . . . befell” the “fearefull Damozell.” 9 to weet: to wit; namely. 10 At iv.49–53.

Canto Seven The witches sonne loves Florimell: She flyes, he faines to dy. Satyrane1 saves the Squyre of Dames From Gyaunts tyranny.

1

Like as an Hynd2 forth singled from the heard, That hath escaped from a ravenous beast, Yet flyes away of her owne feete afeard, And every leafe, that shaketh with the least3 Murmure of winde, her terror hath encreast; So fledd fayre Florimell from her vaine feare, Long after she from perill was releast: Each shade she saw, and each noyse she did heare, Did seeme to be the same, which she escapt whileare.

2

All that same evening she in flying spent, And all that night her course continewed: Ne did she let dull sleepe once to relent, Nor wearinesse to slack her hast, but fled Ever alike, as if her former dred Were hard behind, her ready to arrest: And her white Palfrey having conquered The maistring raines out of her weary wrest,4 Perforce her carried, where ever he thought best.

1 Satyrane: first introduced at I.vi.20, this “noble warlike knight” was the offspring of a married woman and a satyr (half man, half goat, and infamously lecherous). Thyamis’ husband habitually ignored her in order to go hunting, so she wandered into the forest in search of him. A satyr abducted her, impregnated her, kept her until the boy was born, and then let her go but kept the boy. He raised Satyrane in the woods, teaching him to overpower and tame wild beasts.

2

Hynd: female red deer. An unusually strong enjambment for Spenser. 4 I.e., her white horse having taken the mastering reins out of her weary grasp. In emblem books of the period, a runaway horse symbolizes emotion acting without the guidance of reason. 3

129

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3

So long as breath, and hable puissaunce1 Did native corage unto him supply, His pace he freshly forward did advaunce, And carried her beyond all jeopardy, But nought that wanteth rest, can long aby.2 He having through incessant traveill3 spent His force, at last perforce adowne did ly, Ne foot could further move: The Lady gent Thereat was suddein strook with great astonishment.

4

And forst t’alight, on foot mote algates4 fare, A traveiler unwonted5 to such way: Need teacheth her this lesson hard and rare, That fortune all in equall launce doth sway,6 And mortall miseries doth make her play.7 So long she traveild, till at length she came To an hilles side, which did to her bewray8 A litle valley, subject to9 the same, All coverd with thick woodes, that quite it overcame.10

5

Through the tops of the high trees she did descry A litle smoke, whose vapour thin and light, Reeking11 aloft, uprolled to the sky: Which, chearefull signe did send unto her sight, That in the same did wonne some living wight. Eftsoones her steps she thereunto applyd,12 And came at last in weary wretched plight13 Unto the place, to which her hope did guyde, To finde some refuge there, and rest her wearie syde.

1

hable puissaunce: able strength. aby: abide. 3 traveill: labor. 4 algates: always; at any rate. 5 unwonted: unused. 6 launce: balance; sway: rule. 7 I.e., humans’ miseries provide Fortune with amusement. 2

8

bewray: reveal. subject to: beneath. 10 overcame: covered. 11 Reeking: billowing, rising (almost always used to describe the emission of smoke, vapor, or blood). 12 applyd: directed. 13 plight: condition. 9

Canto Seven

131

6

There in a gloomy hollow glen she found A little cottage, built of stickes and reedes In homely1 wize, and wald with sods around, In which a witch did dwell, in loathly weedes,2 And wilfull want,3 all carelesse of her needes, So choosing solitarie to abide, Far from all neighbours, that her divelish deedes And hellish arts from people she might hide, And hurt far off unknowne, whom ever she envide.

7

The Damzell there arriving entred in; Where sitting on the flore the Hag she found, Busie (as seem’d) about some wicked gin:4 Who soone as she beheld that suddein stound,5 Lightly upstarted from the dustie ground, And with fell looke and hollow deadly gaze Stared on her awhile, as one astound, Ne had one word to speake, for great amaze, But shewd by outward signes, that dread her sence did daze.

8

At last turning her feare to foolish wrath, She askt, what devill had her thether brought, And who she was, and what unwonted path Had guided her, unwelcomed, unsought. To which the Damzell full of doubtfull6 thought, Her mildly answer’d; “Beldame be not wroth With silly Virgin by adventure7 brought Unto your dwelling, ignorant and loth,8 That crave but rowme to rest, while tempest overblo’th.”

9

With that adowne out of her christall eyne9 Few trickling teares she softly forth let fall, That like two orient10 perles, did purely shyne Upon her snowy cheeke; and therewithall11

1

7

2

8

homely: homelike. weedes: clothing. 3 wilfull want: intentional poverty. 4 gin: stratagem, plot. 5 stound: shocking event; sudden attack (Florimell’s unexpected entry). 6 doubtfull: anxious.

adventure: accident, chance. loth: loath, reluctant. 9 eyne: eyes. 10 orient: from the east; precious; lustrous. 11 therewithall: in addition to that, besides.

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She sighed soft, that none so bestiall, Nor salvage hart, but ruth1 of her sad plight Would make to melt, or pitteously appall;2 And that vile Hag, all were her whole delight In mischiefe,3 was much moved at so pitteous sight. 10

And gan recomfort her in her rude4 wyse, With womanish compassion of her plaint, Wiping the teares from her suffused eyes, And bidding her sit downe, to rest her faint And wearie limbs a while. She nothing quaint5 Nor s’deignfull of so homely fashion, Sith brought she was now to so hard constraint,6 Sate downe upon the dusty ground anon,7 As glad of that small rest, as Bird of 8 tempest gon.

11

Tho gan she gather up her garments rent, And her loose lockes to dight in order dew, With golden wreath and gorgeous ornament; Whom such whenas the wicked Hag did vew, She was astonisht at her heavenly hew, And doubted her to deeme an earthly wight, But or some Goddesse, or of Dianes crew, And thought her to adore with humble spright; T’adore thing so divine as beauty, were but right.

12

This wicked woman had a wicked sonne, The comfort of her age and weary dayes, A laesy loord, for nothing good to donne,9 But stretched forth in ydlenesse alwayes, Ne ever cast his mind to covet10 prayse, Or ply11 him selfe to any honest trade,

1

6

2

7

ruth: pity. appall: make pale or feeble (with pity); check or quell. 3 I.e., even though her only delight consisted of doing mischief. 4 rude: unsophisticated, crude. 5 quaint: choosy.

constraint: necessity; affliction. anon: immediately. 8 of: out of. 9 I.e., lazy lout, good for nothing. 10 covet: wish for. 11 ply: apply.

Canto Seven

133

But all the day before the sunny rayes He us’d to slug,1 or sleepe in slothfull shade: Such laesinesse both lewd2 and poore attonce him made. 13

He comming home at undertime,3 there found The fayrest creature, that he ever saw, Sitting beside his mother on the ground; The sight whereof did greatly him adaw,4 And his base thought with terrour and with aw So inly smot, that as one, which hath gaz’d On the bright Sunne unwares, doth soone withdraw His feeble eyne, with too much brightnes daz’d, So stared he on her, and stood long while amaz’d.

14

Softly at last he gan his mother aske, What mister5 wight that was, and whence deriv’d, That in so straunge disguizement there did maske, And by what accident she there arriv’d: But she, as one nigh of her wits depriv’d, With nought but ghastly lookes him answered, Like to a ghost, that lately is reviv’d From Stygian shores, where late it wandered; So both at her, and each at other wondered.

15

But the fayre Virgin was so meeke and myld, That she to them vouchsafed to embace6 Her goodly port,7 and to their senses vyld, Her gentle speach applyde, that in short space She grew familiare in that desert8 place. During which time, the Chorle9 through her so kind And courteise use conceiv’d affection bace, And cast to love her in his brutish mind; No love, but brutish lust, that was so beastly tind.10

1

5

2

6

slug: idle around. lewd: ignorant. 3 undertime: undern-time, which denoted various hours of the day: 9:00 AM, noon, or afternoon; a meal taken at any of these times. 4 adaw: overawe, daunt; subdue.

mister: sort of, kind of. embace: lower, condescend, humble. 7 port: carriage; demeanor. 8 familiare: friendly; desert: deserted. 9 Chorle: churl. 10 tind: ignited.

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16

Closely the wicked flame his bowels brent,1 And shortly grew into outrageous fire; Yet had he not the hart, nor hardiment,2 As unto her to utter his desire; His caytive thought durst3 not so high aspire, But with soft sighes, and lovely semblaunces,4 He ween’d that his affection entire She should aread; many resemblaunces5 To her he made, and many kinde remembraunces.6

17

Oft from the forrest wildings7 he did bring, Whose sides empurpled8 were with smyling red, And oft young birds, which he had taught to sing His maistresse praises, sweetly caroled, Girlonds of flowres sometimes for her faire hed He fine would dight; sometimes the squirrell wild He brought to her in bands, as conquered To be her thrall, his fellow servant9 vild; All which, she of him tooke with countenance meeke and mild.

18

But past awhile, when she fit season10 saw To leave that desert mansion,11 she cast In secret wize her selfe thence to withdraw, For feare of mischiefe, which she did forecast Might by the witch or by her sonne compast:12 Her wearie Palfrey closely, as she might,13

1

Closely: secretly; brent: burned. hardiment: courage. 3 caytive: vile, wretched (literally “captive”; to call someone a “slave” was a serious insult); durst: dared. 4 semblaunces: shows, empty demonstrations of love (empty because what the loutish son feels is mere lust). Compare Timias’ resolute silence about his love for Belphoebe (v.44–48). 5 resemblaunces: shows, empty demonstrations of love. 6 remembraunces: keepsakes. 2

7

wildings: wild crabapples; wild fruit of various kinds. 8 empurpled: in poetic terms, “purple” often means “red.” 9 servant: suitor; wooer professing service to his lady. 10 past awhile: after a while had passed; season: time. 11 mansion: dwelling. 12 compast: compassed, devised. 13 closely, as she might: as secretly as she could.

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Now well recovered after long repast, In his proud furnitures1 she freshly dight, His late miswandred wayes now to remeasure2 right. 19

And earely ere the dawning day appeard, She forth issewed, and on her journey went; She went in perill, of each noyse affeard, And of each shade, that did it selfe present; For still she feared to be overhent,3 Of that vile hag, or her uncivile sonne: Who when too late awaking, well they kent,4 That their fayre guest was gone, they both begonne To make exceeding mone, as they had beene undonne.

20

But that lewd lover did the most lament For her depart,5 that ever man did heare; He knockt his brest with desperate intent, And scratcht his face, and with his teeth did teare His rugged flesh, and rent his ragged heare: That his sad mother seeing his sore plight, Was greatly woe begon, and gan to feare, Least his fraile senses were emperisht6 quight, And love to frenzy turnd, sith love is franticke hight.7

21

All wayes shee sought, him to restore to plight,8 With herbs, with charms, with counsel, and with teares, But tears, nor charms,9 nor herbs, nor counsell might Asswage the fury, which his entrails teares: So strong is passion, that no reason heares. Tho when all other helpes she saw to faile, She turnd her selfe backe to her wicked leares10 And by her divelish arts thought to prevaile, To bring her backe againe, or worke her finall bale.11

1

furnitures: saddle, reins, and other equipment. 2 remeasure: retrace. 3 overhent: overtaken. 4 kent: kenned, knew. 5 depart: departure. 6 emperisht: empaired.

7

I.e., since love is called madness. plight: healthy condition. 9 I.e., neither tears nor charms. 10 leares: lore, learning—in this case, witchcraft. 11 finall bale: final harm, i.e., death. 8

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22

Eftesoones out of her hidden cave she cald An hideous beast, of horrible aspect, That could the stoutest corage have appald; Monstrous, mishapt, and all his backe was spect With thousand spots of colours queint elect,1 Thereto so swifte, that it all beasts did pas:2 Like never yet did living eie detect; But likest it to an Hyena3 was, That feeds on wemens flesh, as others feede on gras.

23

It forth she cald, and gave it streight4 in charge, Through thicke and thin her5 to poursew apace, Ne once to stay to rest, or breath6 at large, Till her he had attaind, and brought in place,7 Or quite devourd her beauties scornefull grace. The Monster swifte as word, that from her went, Went forth in haste, and did her footing trace So sure and swiftly, through his perfect sent,8 And passing9 speede, that shortly he her overhent.

24

Whom when the fearefull Damzell nigh10 espide, No need to bid her fast away to flie; That ugly shape so sore her terrifide, That it she shund no lesse, then dread to die, And her flitt11 Palfrey did so well apply His nimble feet to her conceived feare, That whilest his breath did strength to him supply, From perill free he her away did beare: But when his force gan faile, his pace gan wex areare.12

25

Which whenas she perceiv’d, she was dismayd At that same last extremity ful sore, And of her safety greatly grew afrayd;

1

queint elect: ingeniously chosen (for camouflage or for a horrible appearance).

2

Thereto: moreover; pas: surpass. 3 Hyena: traditionally associated with witches and with treacherous violence. 4 streight: strictly; straightway. 5 her: Florimell. 6 breath: rest.

7 8

in place: here (to the witch’s cottage).

sent: scent, sense of smell. passing: surpassing. 10 nigh: nearby. 11 flitt: fleet, swift. 12 wex areare: grow backward, i.e., become slower. 9

Canto Seven

137

And now she gan approch to the sea shore, As it befell,1 that she could flie no more, But yield her selfe to spoile2 of greedinesse. Lightly she leaped, as a wight forlore,3 From her dull horse, in desperate distresse, And to her feet betooke her doubtfull sickernesse.4 26

Not halfe so fast the wicked Myrrha5 fled From dread of her revenging fathers hond: Nor halfe so fast to save her maydenhed, Fled fearfull Daphne6 on th’AEgaean strond, As Florimell fled from that Monster yond,7 To reach the sea, ere she of him were raught:8 For in the sea to drowne her selfe she fond,9 Rather then of the tyrant to be caught: Thereto fear gave her wings, and need her corage taught.

27

It fortuned (high God did so ordaine) As shee arrived on the roring shore, In minde to leape into the mighty maine,10 A little bote lay hoving11 her before, In which there slept a fisher old and pore, The whiles his nets were drying on the sand: Into the same shee lept, and with the ore Did thrust the shallop from the floting strand:12 So safety fownd at sea, which she fownd not at land.

1

befell: happened. spoile: despoilation. 3 forlore: lost. 4 doubtfull sickernesse: unlikely safety. 5 Myrrha: tricked her father into committing incest; see ii.41.1.n. 6 Daphne: rejected all suitors because she did not want to be controlled by a husband; Apollo fell in love with her and pursued her through the forest, whereupon she asked her father, a river god, to destroy her beauty. He changed her into a laurel tree, 2

completely unlike her former self except for its beauty. Apollo made a wreath for his head from her leaves (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 1.452–567). 7 yond: furious; savage. 8

of him: by him; raught: snatched. fond: undertook (OED “fand” v6). 10 maine: sea. 11 hoving: lying at anchor. 12 I.e., thrust the little boat from the shore off which it was floating. 9

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28

The Monster ready on the pray to sease,1 Was of his forward2 hope deceived quight, Ne durst assay3 to wade the perlous seas, But greedily long gaping at the sight, At last in vaine was forst to turne his flight, And tell the idle tidings4 to his Dame: Yet to avenge his divelishe despight, He sett upon her Palfrey tired lame, And slew him cruelly, ere any reskew came.

29

And after having him embowelled, To fill his hellish gorge, it chaunst a knight To passe that way, as forth he traveiled; Yt was a goodly Swaine,5 and of great might, As ever man that bloody field did fight; But in vain sheows, that wont yong knights bewitch, And courtly services tooke no delight, But rather joyd to bee, then seemen sich: For both to be and seeme to him was labor lich.6

30

It was to weete the good Sir Satyrane,7 That raungd abrode to seeke adventures wilde, As was his wont in forest, and in plaine; He was all armd in rugged steele unfilde,8 As in the smoky forge it was compilde,9 And in his Scutchin bore a Satyres hedd:10 He comming present, where the Monster vilde Upon that milke-white Palfreyes carcas fedd, Unto his reskew ran, and greedily him spedd.11

1

on the pray to sease: to seize on the prey. 2 forward: imminent; foremost. 3 assay: attempt. 4 idle tidings: worthless news. 5 Swaine: young man. 6 lich: like. It was just as much work for him to seem to be a good knight as actually to be one.

7 to weete: to wit, namely; Satyrane: see Argument, note. 8 unfilde: unpolished; crude. 9 compilde: constructed. 10 Scutchin: escutcheon, shield on which a coat of arms is depicted; Satyres hedd: see Argument, note. 11 his: the horse’s; greedily: eagerly; him spedd: succeeded; hurried himself; made the hyena run away.

Canto Seven

31

There well perceivd he, that it was the horse, Whereon faire Florimell was wont to ride, That of that feend was rent without remorse: Much feared he, least ought did ill betide To that faire Maide, the flowre of wemens pride; For her he dearely loved,1 and in all His famous conquests highly magnifide:2 Besides her golden girdle,3 which did fall From her in flight, he fownd, that did him sore apall.

32

Full of sad feare, and doubtfull agony, Fiercely he flew upon that wicked feend, And with huge strokes, and cruell battery Him forst to leave his pray, for to attend Him selfe from deadly daunger to defend: Full many wounds in his corrupted flesh He did engrave, and muchell blood did spend, Yet might not doe him die, but aie4 more fresh And fierce he still appeard, the more he did him thresh.5

33

He wist not, how him to despoile of life, Ne how to win the wished victory, Sith him he saw still stronger grow through strife, And him selfe weaker through infirmity; Greatly he grew enrag’d, and furiously Hurling his sword away, he lightly lept Upon the beast, that with great cruelty Rored, and raged to be underkept:6 Yet he perforce him held, and strokes upon him hept.7

34

As he that strives to stop a suddein flood, And in strong bancks his violence enclose, Forceth it swell above his wonted mood, And largely overflow the fruitfull plaine, That all the countrey seemes to be a Maine,8

1 So Satyrane loves Florimell, who loves Marinell, who loves no one. 2 magnifide: glorified her by fighting in her name. 3 girdle: sash.

4

aie: aye, always. thresh: thrash. 6 underkept: kept down; subjected. 7 hept: heaped. 8 Maine: sea. 5

139

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And the rich furrowes flote, all quite fordonne:1 The wofull husbandman doth lowd complaine, To see his whole yeares labor lost so soone, For which to God he made so many an idle boone.2 35

So him he held, and did through might amate:3 So long he held him, and him bett4 so long, That at the last his fiercenes gan abate, And meekely stoup unto the victor strong: Who to avenge the implacable wrong, Which he supposed donne to Florimell, Sought by all meanes his dolor to prolong, Sith dint of steele his carcas could not quell: His maker with her charmes had framed him so well.

36

The golden ribband,5 which that virgin wore About her sclender waste, he tooke in hand, And with it bownd the beast, that lowd did rore For great despight of that unwonted band,6 Yet dared not his victor to withstand, But trembled like a lambe, fled from the pray,7 And all the way him followd on the strand, As he had long bene learned8 to obay; Yet never learned he such service, till that day.

37

Thus as he led the Beast along the way, He spide far off a mighty Giauntesse, Fast flying on a Courser9 dapled gray, From a bold knight, that with great hardinesse Her hard pursewd, and sought for to suppresse; She bore before10 her lap a dolefull Squire, Lying athwart her horse in great distresse, Fast bounden hand and foote with cords of wire,11 Whom she did meane to make the thrall of her desire.

1

fordonne: done in, destroyed. boone: prayer of petition. 3 amate: overwhelm. 4 bett: beat. 5 ribband: ribbon. 6 band: bond. 7 pray: one who preys upon another. 2

8

learned: taught. Courser: swift horse. 10 before: in front of. 11 As Hamilton points out, every other time when Spenser uses the word “wire,” he is comparing a beautiful woman’s hair with golden wire. Implicitly, then, the doleful Squire is bound by a woman’s 9

Canto Seven

38

Which whenas Satyrane beheld, in haste He lefte his captive Beast at liberty, And crost the nearest way, by which he cast Her to encounter, ere she passed by: But she the way shund nathemore for thy,1 But forward gallopt fast, which when he spyde, His mighty speare he couched2 warily, And at her ran: she having him descryde, Her selfe to fight addrest, and threw her lode aside.

39

Like as a Goshauke,3 that in foote doth beare A trembling Culver,4 having spide on hight An Eagle, that with plumy5 wings doth sheare The subtile ayre, stouping6 with all his might, The quarrey throwes to ground with fell despight, And to the batteill doth her selfe prepare: So ran the Geauntesse unto the fight; Her fyrie eyes with furious sparkes did stare,7 And with blasphemous bannes8 high God in peeces tare.

40

She caught in hand an huge great yron mace, Wherewith she many had of life depriv’d, But ere the stroke could seize his9 aymed place, His speare amids her sun-brode10 shield arriv’d, Yet nathemore the steele a sonder riv’d,11 All were the beame12 in bignes like a mast, Ne her out of the stedfast sadle driv’d, But glauncing on the tempred metall, brast In thousand shivers, and so forth beside her past.

charms, and his desire has become monstrous (Hamilton, FQ III.vii.37.8.n.). 1 for thy: therefore, because of that. 2 couched: lowered to the position for attack. 3 Goshauke: goshawk, a particular type of hawk. 4 Culver: dove. 5 plumy: feathery.

141

6

subtile: rarefied, thin; stouping: diving for the kill. 7

stare: shine; stare. bannes: curses. 9 his: its. 10 sun-brode: as broad as the sun. 11 a sonder riv’d: cleaved asunder. 12 All were the beame: even though the spear’s shaft was. 8

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41

Her Steed did stagger with that puissaunt strooke; But she no more was moved with that might, Then it1 had lighted on an aged Oke; Or on the marble Pillour, that is pight Upon the top of Mount Olympus hight, For the brave youthly Champions to assay, With burning charet wheeles it nigh to smite: But who that smites it, mars his joyous play, And is the spectacle of ruinous decay.2

42

Yet therewith sore enrag’d, with sterne regard Her dreadfull weapon she to him addrest, Which on his helmet martelled3 so hard, That made him low incline his lofty crest, And bowd his battred visour to his brest: Wherewith hee was so stund, that he n’ote4 ryde But reeled to and fro from east to west:5 Which when his cruell enimy espyde, She lightly unto him adjoyned syde to syde;6

43

And on his collar laying puissaunt hand, Out of his wavering seat him pluckt perforse,7 Perforse him pluckt, unable to withstand, Or helpe himselfe, and laying thwart her horse, In loathly wise like to a carrion corse,8 She bore him fast away. Which when the knight, That her pursewed, saw with great remorse,9 He nere was touched in his noble spright, And gan encrease his speed, as she encreast her flight.

1

Then it: than if it. In the ancient Olympic games, imagined by Spenser’s contemporaries to have been held on Mount Olympus, chariots ran a race in which they had to reverse course around a pillar, coming close to it in order not to lose time but not coming close enough to crash into it. 3 martelled: hammered. 2

4

n’ote: could not. This is the sort of scene understandably beloved of Monty Python—and indeed, the entire story of the Squire on the Giantesse’s lap has a parodic edge. 6 I.e., approached alongside. 7 perforse: by force. 8 corse: corpse. 9 remorse: compassion. 5

Canto Seven

44

Whom when as nigh approching she espyde, She threw away her burden angrily; For she list not the batteill to abide,1 But made her selfe more light, away to fly: Yet her the hardy knight pursewd so nye That almost in the backe he oft her strake:2 But still when him at hand she did espy, She turnd, and semblaunce of faire fight did make; But when he stayd, to flight againe she did her take.

45

By this3 the good Sir Satyrane gan wake Out of his dreame, that did him long entraunce,4 And seeing none in place,5 he gan to make Exceeding mone, and curst that cruell chaunce, Which reft from him so faire a chevisaunce:6 At length he spyde, whereas that wofull Squyre, Whom he had reskewed from captivaunce Of his strong foe, lay tombled in the myre, Unable to arise, or foot or hand to styre.7

46

To whom approching, well he mote perceive In that fowle plight a comely8 personage, And lovely face, made fit for to deceive Fraile Ladies hart with loves consuming rage, Now in the blossome of his freshest age: He reard him up, and loosd his yron bands,9 And after gan inquire his parentage, And how he fell into the Gyaunts hands, And who that was, which chaced her along the lands.

47

Then trembling yet through feare, the Squire bespake, “That Geauntesse Argante10 is behight, A daughter of the Titans which did make

1

abide: continue. strake: struck. 3 By this: by this time. 4 I.e., being struck so hard that he reeled from east to west (42.7). 5 in place: right there. 6 chevisaunce: chivalric deed; goal; booty. 7 styre: stir. 2

8

143

comely: handsome. yron bands: cf. “cords of wire,” 37.8. 10 In Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), a romanticized account of the First Crusade, Argantes is a Circassian warrior who fights against the Christians. In Layamon’s Brut, Argante is a name for Morgan le Fay, the fairy who sometimes helps and sometimes harms King Arthur. 9

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Warre against heven, and heaped hils on hight, To scale the skyes, and put Jove from his right:1 Her syre Typhoeus2 was, who mad through merth, And dronke with blood of men, slaine by his might, Through incest, her of his owne mother Earth Whylome begot, being but halfe twin of that berth. 48

“For at that berth another Babe she bore, To weet the mightie Ollyphant,3 that wrought Great wreake to many errant knights of yore,4 Till him Chylde Thopas to confusion5 brought. These twinnes, men say, (a thing far passing6 thought) Whiles in their mothers wombe enclosd they were, Ere they into the lightsom7 world were brought, In fleshly lust were mingled both yfere,8 And in that monstrous wise did to the world appere.

49

“So liv’d they ever after in like sin, Gainst natures law, and good behaveoure: But greatest shame was to that maiden twin, Who not content so fowly to devoure Her native flesh, and staine her brothers bowre, Did wallow in all other fleshly myre, And suffred beastes her body to deflowre: So whot she burned in that lustfull fyre, Yet all that might not slake her sensuall desyre.

1 The ultimately unsuccessful war of the Giants against Zeus and the other Olympians is found in many sources of Greek myth, though Spenser seems to have invented Argante’s place in it. Hesiod and Ovid differ somewhat in their descriptions of the time and nature of the revolt; see Theogony (617–735) and Metamorphoses (1.151–62). 2 Typhoeus: a giant who is also a powerful wind. 3 Ollyphant: not found in Greek myth. The name, which comes from Chaucer’s “Tale of Sir Thopas” (807–9), means “ele-

phant,” with the standard phallic association. 4 wreake: harm; yore: olden times. 5 Till him Chylde Thopas to: “And many hath to foule” (1596). Because Chaucer left “The Tale of Sir Thopas” unfinished, he did not actually write about the inevitable slaying of Sir Oliphant by Sir Thopas. Chylde: courtesy title for a youth of gentle birth; confusion: downfall. 6 passing: surpassing. 7 lightsom: filled with light. 8 yfere: as companions.

Canto Seven

145

50

“But over all the countrie she did raunge, To seeke young men, to quench her flaming thurst, And feed her fancy with delightfull chaunge:1 Whom so2 she fittest findes to serve her lust, Through her maine3 strength, in which she most doth trust, She with her bringes into a secret Ile,4 Where in eternall bondage dye he must, Or be the vassall5 of her pleasures vile, And in all shamefull sort him selfe with her defile.

51

“Me seely wretch she so at vauntage caught,6 After she long in waite for me did lye, And meant unto her prison to have brought, Her lothsom pleasure there to satisfye; That thousand deathes me lever were7 to dye, Then breake the vow, that to faire Columbell 8 I plighted9 have, and yet keepe stedfastly: As for my name, it mistreth not10 to tell; Call me the Squyre of Dames that me beseemeth11 well.

52

“But that bold knight, whom ye pursuing saw That Geauntesse, is not such, as she seemd, But a faire virgin, that in martiall law, And deedes of armes above all Dames is deemd, And above many knightes is eke esteemd, For her great worth; She Palladine12 is hight: She you from death, you me from dread redeemd. Ne any may that Monster match in fight, But she, or such as she, that is so chaste a wight.”13

1

chaunge: women were often called changeable when being accused of having fickle and immodest sexual appetites. 2 Whom so: whomever. 3 maine: sheer. 4 Ile: isle. 5 vassall: sworn servant. 6 I.e., she caught me, pitiful wretch, at a moment when she had the advantage (or by chance). 7 me lever were: I would rather. 8 Columbell: French for “dove.”

9

plighted: pledged. it mistreth not: it is unnecessary (OED “mister” v11). 11 Squyre of Dames: a title (possibly invented by Spenser) that parodies the “Squire of the Body,” a personal servant of a king, queen, or other dignitary; beseemeth: suits. 12 Palladine: from “paladin,” a paragon of chivalry. 13 For those readers who may have lost track of the rapid sequence of events (a not uncommon experience while reading The 10

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53

“Her well beseemes that Quest” (quoth Satyrane) “But read, thou Squyre of Dames, what vow is this, Which thou upon thy selfe hast lately ta’ne?” “That shall I you recount” (quoth he) “ywis,1 So be ye pleasd to pardon all amis.2 That gentle Lady, whom I love and serve, After long suit and wearie servicis,3 Did aske me, how I could her love deserve, And how she might be sure, that I would never swerve.

54

“I glad by any meanes her grace4 to gaine, Badd her commaund my life to save, or spill.5 Eftsoones she badd me, with incessaunt paine6 To wander through the world abroad at will, And every where, where with my power or skill I might doe service7 unto gentle Dames, That I the same should faithfully fulfill, And at the twelve monethes end should bring their names And pledges;8 as the spoiles of my victorious games.

Faerie Queene), a summary of Florimell’s story may be in order: Florimell, in search of Marinell, is pursued by a lustful Forester, who is driven off by Timias and Arthur. Florimell continues to flee from Arthur, takes refuge in a witch’s house, and is figuratively pursued by the witch’s lustful son. When Florimell flees the house, the witch sends a hyena after her, so Florimell jumps into a little boat, leaving her horse behind to be eaten by the hyena. Satyrane, who loves Florimell, sees the hyena with Florimell’s horse and fears the hyena has also eaten Florimell. After subduing the hyena and putting it on a leash, he sees a Giantess with a trussed-up Squire across her saddle, pursued by another knight. Satyrane and the Giantess square off, and she throws the bound Squire to the ground so he will not get in the way. Satyrane strikes the Giantess, who, undaunted, gives him such a blow that it makes him reel in a daze. She slings him across her saddle. The unnamed knight who had been pursuing her now resumes pursuit, at which she flees, tossing

Satyrane to the ground to lighten her load. Satyrane revives, releases the Squire from his bands, and listens to his story. The Squire of Dames reveals that the knight who pursued the Giantess Argante was Palladine, a woman in armor, and that only a woman could have subdued Argante. Palladine never appears in the poem again. 1 ywis: certainly. 2 I.e., to pardon anything in my tale that is inappropriate. 3 servicis: services, sexual or otherwise. 4 grace: favor. 5 Badd: bade; spill: destroy. 6 paine: labor; trouble; care. 7 doe service: a transparent double entendre: a wooer was supposed to serve his beloved, and a knight was supposed to serve any lady in need, but to “do service” for a woman was to have sex with her. 8 pledges: love tokens (such as handkerchiefs or locks of hair); oral or written promises of love.

Canto Seven

55

“So well I to faire Ladies service did, And found such favour in their loving hartes, That ere the yeare his course had compassid, Three hundred pledges for my good desartes,1 And thrise three hundred thanks for my good partes2 I with me brought, and did to her present: Which when she saw, more bent to eke my smartes,3 Then to reward my trusty true intent, She gan for me devise a grievous punishment.

56

“To weet, that I my traveill should resume, And with like labour walke the world arownd, Ne ever to her presence should presume, Till I so many other Dames had fownd, The which, for all the suit I could propownd,4 Would me refuse their pledges to afford,5 But did abide for ever chaste and sownd.” “Ah gentle Squyre” (quoth he) “tell at one word, How many fowndst thou such to put in thy record?”

57

“In deed Sir knight” (said he) “one word may tell All, that I ever fownd so wisely stayd;6 For onely three they were disposd so well, And yet three yeares I now abrode have strayd, To fynd them out.” “Mote I” (then laughing sayd The knight) “inquire of thee, what were those three, The which thy proffred curtesie denayd? Or7 ill they seemed sure avizd to bee, Or brutishly brought up, that nev’r did fashions see.”8

58

“The first which then refused me” (said hee) “Certes was but a common Courtisane,9 Yet flat refusd to have a doe10 with mee,

147

1

7

2

8 Satyrane humorously suggests that chastity

desartes: deserts. partes: characteristics, but with a pun on genitalia. 3 bent: inclined; eke: augment; smartes: torment. 4 I.e., for all the requests I could propose. 5 afford: give, provide. 6 stayd: steadied, immovable (characteristic of a virtuous woman, as opposed to being changeable).

Or: either.

is not currently fashionable. common Courtisane: prostitute (as opposed to a court mistress, who could also be called a courtesan). 10 have a doe: have it off with, have sex with. 9

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Because I could not give her many a Jane.”1 (Thereat full hartely laughed Satyrane) “The second was an holy Nunne to chose,2 Which would not let me be her Chappellane,3 Because she knew, she sayd, I would disclose Her counsell, if she should her trust in me repose.4 59

“The third a Damzell was of low degree,5 Whom I in countrey cottage fownd by chaunce; Full litle weened I, that chastitee Had lodging in so meane a maintenaunce,6 Yet was she fayre, and in her countenaunce Dwelt simple truth in seemely fashion. Long thus I woo’d her with dew observaunce, In hope unto my pleasure to have won, But was as far7 at last, as when I first begon.

60

“Safe8 her, I never any woman found, That chastity did for it selfe embrace,9 But were for other causes firme and sound, Either for want of handsome10 time and place, Or else for feare of shame and fowle disgrace. Thus am I hopelesse ever to attaine My Ladies love, in such a desperate case, But all my dayes am like to waste in vaine, Seeking to match the chaste with th’unchaste Ladies traine.”11

1

6

2 to

7

Jane: silver half-penny. chose: by choice (OED “choose” v12, adv. sense); devoted to her calling (OED “choose” v10).

3 Chappellane: chaplain, confessor—with the common Protestant insinuation that nuns had sex with their confessors. 4 A priest was not supposed to disclose anything told in the confessional; the nun fears that the Squire of Dames will kiss and tell, so to speak. 5 degree: social status.

maintenaunce: state of living. as far: i.e., as far from succeeding. 8 Safe: save, except for. 9 I.e., who chose chastity for the sake of chastity itself. 10

handsome: convenient. I.e., seeking to find a match for the chastity of my Lady in the unchastity of a series of other ladies; seeking to fit my Lady’s chaste plot to the unchaste plots of other ladies. 11

Canto Seven

61

1

“Perdy,” (sayd Satyrane) “thou Squyre of Dames, Great labour fondly hast thou hent1 in hand, To get small thankes, and therewith many blames, That may emongst Alcides2 labours stand.” Thence backe returning to the former land, Where late he left the Beast, he overcame,3 He found him not; for he had broke his band, And was returnd againe unto his Dame,4 To tell what tydings5 of fayre Florimell became.

hent: taken, grasped. Alcides: Hercules. An oracle directed him to do whatever King Eurystheus required of him, which turned out to be twelve “labors,” each a seemingly impossible task that he nevertheless performed successfully.

2

149

3 the Beast, he overcame: the hyena that he had overcome. 4 I.e., after breaking the golden sash with which Satyrane had bound him (stanza 36), the hyena had returned to his mistress, the witch. 5

tydings: news.

Canto Eight The Witch creates a snowy Lady, like to Florimell, Who wrongd by Carle by Proteus1 sav’d, is sought by Paridell.2

1

So oft as I this history3 record, My hart doth melt with meere4 compassion, To thinke, how causelesse of her owne accord5 This gentle Damzell, whom I write upon, Should plonged be in such affliction, Without all hope of comfort or reliefe,6 That sure I weene, the hardest hart of stone, Would hardly finde to7 aggravate her griefe; For misery craves rather mercy, then repriefe.8

2

1

But that accursed Hag, her hostesse late, Had so enranckled9 her malitious hart, That she desyrd th’abridgement of her fate,10 Or long enlargement of her painefull smart. Now when the Beast,11 which by her wicked art Late foorth she sent, she backe retourning spyde, Tyde with her12 golden girdle, it a part Of her rich spoyles, whom he had earst destroyd,13 She weend, and wondrous gladnes to her hart applyde.

Carle: churl; Proteus: a sea god capable of assuming any shape. 2 Paridell: a name that associates him with Paris, whose abduction of Helen caused the Trojan War. 3 history: a narrative of fictional or factual events, though the word was increasingly used in the latter sense. 4 meere: pure, unmixed. 5 I.e., through no blame of her own—or for no reason, of her own accord. 6 With wide-eyed innocence, Spenser’s narrator deplores the fact that a maiden as gen-

teel as Florimell has ended up in such a sea of troubles. The cause of those troubles is, of course, Spenser (cf. 43.8 and IV.i.1). 7 finde to: find the will or desire to. 8 repriefe: reproof. 9 enranckled: rankled in, festered in. 10 her fate: the span of life alloted to Florimell by the Fates, goddesses who determined each baby’s lifespan at birth. 11 the Beast: the hyena. 12 her: Florimell’s. 13 I.e., that the sash was a part of Florimell’s goods, which the hyena got after killing her.

150

Canto Eight

3

And with it ronning hast’ly to her sonne, Thought with that sight him much to have reliv’d;1 Who thereby deeming sure the thing as donne, His former griefe with furie fresh reviv’d, Much more then earst, and would have algates riv’d2 The hart out of his brest: for sith her dedd He surely dempt,3 himselfe he thought depriv’d Quite of all hope, wherewith he long had fedd His foolish malady, and long time had misledd.

4

With thought whereof, exceeding mad he grew, And in his rage his mother would have slaine, Had she not fled into a secret mew,4 Where she was wont her Sprightes to entertaine The maisters of her art: there was she faine5 To call them all in order to her ayde, And them conjure upon eternall paine,6 To counsell her so carefully7 dismayd, How she might heale her sonne, whose senses were decayd.

5

By their device,8 and her owne wicked wit, She there deviz’d a wondrous worke to frame,9 Whose like on earth was never framed yit, That even Nature selfe envide the same, And grudg’d to see the counterfet should shame The thing it selfe: In hand she10 boldly tooke To make another like the former Dame, Another Florimell, in shape and looke So lively and so like,11 that many it mistooke.

1

reliv’d: revived, reinvigorated. riv’d: torn. 3 dempt: deemed. 4 mew: hiding place. 5 The maisters of her art: an appositive to “her Sprights”; they are her familiars, demons that a witch can command to perform magic that she could not perform without them; faine: disposed; wont, used. 2

6

151

conjure: command; upon eternall paine: under the threat of eternal pain. 7 carefully: with care, grievously. 8 device: machination. 9 to frame: to construct. 10 she: the witch. 11 So lively and so like: so lifelike and so like Florimell.

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6

The substance,1 whereof she the body made, Was purest snow in massy mould2 congeald, Which she had gathered in a shady glade Of the Riphœan hils,3 to her reveald By errant4 Sprights, but from all men conceald: The same she tempred with fine Mercury, And virgin wex,5 that never yet was seald, And mingled them with perfect vermily,6 That like a lively sanguine7 it seemd to the eye.

7

In stead of eyes two burning lampes she set In silver sockets, shyning like the skyes, And a quicke moving Spirit did arret8 To stirre and roll9 them, like to womens eyes; In stead of yellow lockes she did devyse, With golden wyre to weave her curled head; Yet golden wyre was not so yellow thryse10 As Florimells fayre heare: and in the stead Of life, she put a Spright to rule the carcas dead.11

8

A wicked Spright yfraught12 with fawning guyle, And fayre resemblance above all the rest, Which with the Prince of Darkenes fell somewhyle,13 From heavens blis and everlasting rest,14

1

8

substance: a common word that has taken on wider meaning after our reading of Canto Six. 2 massy mould: solid form. “Mould” also puns on “earth,” the substance from which Adam was made and therefore a metaphorical term for all mortal flesh (in contrast to the Snowy Florimell’s frozen substance, which is not alive). 3 Riphœan hils: Riphean Mountains, the name used by early geographers for Russia’s Ural Mountains (Paradise, 193–4).

quicke: living; arret: appoint. A woman was criticized for having rolling eyes—meaning that she glanced from side to side flirtatiously. 10 thryse: thrice; i.e., Florimell’s hair was three times as yellow as golden wire. 11 The stanza parodies the standard Petrarchan blazon, in which the beloved’s features are admiringly described, one by one, and compared to beautiful objects—hair like golden wire, cheeks like cherries, eyes like stars, and so on.

4

12

errant: physically wandering, but with a pun on moral wandering. 5 wex: sealing wax. 6 vermily: vermilion. 7 sanguine: blood; the color of blood. One of the four humors, its predominance in the body causes a lecherous character.

9

yfraught: laden. somewhyle: at some time. 14 According to Revelation, a red dragon (later identified with Satan) warred against the faithful angels in heaven, for which he and the angels who had fought on his side were thrown down to earth (12.3–9). 13

Canto Eight

153

Him needed not instruct, which way were best Him selfe to fashion likest Florimell, Ne how to speake, ne how to use his gest;1 For he in counterfesaunce2 did excell, And all the wyles of wemens wits knew passing well. 9

Him shaped3 thus, she deckt in garments gay, Which Florimell had left behind her late, That who so then her saw, would surely say, It was her selfe, whom it did imitate, Or fayrer then her selfe, if ought algate Might fayrer be. And then she forth her brought Unto her sonne, that lay in feeble state; Who seeing her gan streight4 upstart, and thought She was the Lady selfe, who he so long had sought.

10

Tho fast her clipping twixt his armes twayne, Extremely joyed in so happy sight, And soone forgot his former sickely payne; But she,5 the more to seeme such as she hight, Coyly rebutted his embracement light;6 Yet still with gentle countenaunce retain’d, Enough to hold a foole in vaine delight: Him long she so with shadowes entertain’d,7 As her Creatresse had in charge to her ordain’d.

11

Till on a day,8 as he disposed was To walke the woodes with that his Idole faire, Her to disport,9 and idle time to pas, In th’open freshnes of the gentle aire, A knight that way there chaunced to repaire; Yet knight he was not, but a boastfull swaine,

1

gest: comportment, manner. counterfesaunce: counterfeiting. 3 shaped: naturally fitted; transformed; directed (perhaps with a pun on the common saying that God shapes human lives). 4 streight: straightway. 5 An ironic “she,” given that “she” is animated by a male spirit. 2

6 rebutted: rebuffed; light: deftly (referring to her action) or wanton (referring to his embrace). 7 She is a shadow herself, but Spenser is also implying that flirtation is show without substance. 8 on a day: one day. 9 disport: entertain (with sexual overtones).

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That deedes of armes had ever in despaire,1 Proud Braggadocchio, that in vaunting vaine2 His glory did repose, and credit3 did maintaine. 12

He seeing with that Chorle so faire a wight, Decked with many a costly ornament, Much merveiled thereat, as well he might, And thought that match a fowle disparagement:4 His bloody speare eftesoones he boldly bent Against the silly clowne,5 who dead through feare, Fell streight to ground in great astonishment; “Villein” (sayd he)6 “this Lady is my deare, Dy, if thou it gainesay: I will away her beare.”

13

The fearefull Chorle durst not gainesay, nor dooe,7 But trembling stood, and yielded him the pray; Who finding litle leasure her to wooe, On Tromparts steed her mounted without stay,8 And without reskew led her quite away. Proud man himselfe then Braggadochio deem’d,

1 I.e., who despaired of ever performing great feats of war. 2 Braggadocchio: from the English “braggart” and the Italian suffix occio, an intensifier. Spenser invented the name, which is now used generically to refer to anyone like this character. See v.27.9.n.; vaunting vaine: empty boasting. 3 credit: reputation. The relationship between credit as personal reputation and credit as reputation for financial solvency had become a crucial social issue by the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance, as the feudal economy of fixed inheritance and farming changed slowly into an investment economy. A person’s financial credit was established largely by personal reputation and connections, which meant that one had to put on an expensive show in order to prove oneself worthy to borrow money. The result was often bankruptcy, even for aristocrats and previously wealthy members of the merchant class. In Braggadocchio,

Spenser paints a character whose very being is bankrupt. 4 disparagement: insult to the lady, who should have been married to someone of a higher station. (Braggadocchio carries arms and scorns the peasant, yet he has no title, so he must be of a middling class.) 5

clowne: peasant; country bumpkin. Villein: serf; base character; he: Braggadocchio. 7 durst: dared; dooe: do anything to resist. 8 Tromparts: Trompart is Braggadocchio’s vassal; his name implies deception (a “trumper” was a deceiver) and likens him to a trumpet in his flattering willingness to “blow the bellowes to [Braggadocchio’s] swelling vanity” (II.iii.9.9). One cannot help thinking of Hieronymus Bosch’s late fifteenth- or early sixteenth-century painting of the Last Judgment, in which one of the damned plays a trumpet with his anus; stay: delay; hindrance. 6

Canto Eight

155

And next to none,1 after that happy day, Being possessed of that spoyle, which seem’d The fairest wight on ground, and most of men esteem’d. 14

But when hee saw him selfe free from poursute, He gan make gentle purpose2 to his Dame, With termes of love and lewdnesse dissolute; For he could well his glozing speaches frame3 To such vaine uses, that him best became: But she thereto would lend but light regard, As seeming sory, that she ever came Into his powre, that used her so hard, To reave4 her honor, which she more then life prefard.

15

Thus as they two of kindnes treated5 long, There them by chaunce encountred on the way An armed knight, upon a courser6 strong, Whose trampling feete upon the hollow lay7 Seemed to thunder, and did nigh affray8 That Capons9 corage: yet he looked grim, And faynd10 to cheare his lady in dismay, Who seemd for feare to quake in every lim,11 And her to save from outrage, meekely prayed him.12

16

Fiercely that straunger forward came, and nigh Approching, with bold words and bitter threat, Bad that same boaster, as he mote, on high13 To leave to him that lady for excheat,14 Or bide him batteill without further treat.15

1

next to none: i.e., second to none. gentle purpose: genteel conversation. 3 glozing: flattering; frame: adapt; direct. 4 reave: tear away. 5 treated: discussed. 6 courser: swift horse. 7 lay: ground. 8 affray: frighten. 9 Capons: a capon is a rooster that has been castrated to make the meat tender; by extension, the term meant “eunuch” and was 2

used as a term of contempt for a man deemed insufficiently manly. 10 faynd: wanted; attempted; with a pun on the sense “feign,” spelled the same way. 11 lim: limb. 12 I.e., meekly asked him to save her from being raped by the strange knight. 13 Bad: bade; on high: loudly. 14 excheat: forfeit. 15 I.e., endure battle with him, without any further ado.

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That challenge did too peremptory seeme, And fild his senses with abashment great; Yet seeing nigh him jeopardy extreme, He it dissembled well, and light1 seemd to esteeme. 17

Saying, “Thou foolish knight, that weenst with words To steale away, that2 I with blowes have wonne, And broght throgh points of many perilous swords: But if thee list to see thy Courser ronne, Or prove thy selfe, this sad encounter shonne, And seeke els3 without hazard of thy hedd.” At those prowd words that other knight begonne To wex exceeding wroth, and him aredd To turne his steede about, or sure he should be dedd.

18

“Sith then” (said Braggadochio) “needes thou wilt4 Thy daies abridge, through proofe5 of puissaunce, Turne we our steeds, that both in equall tilt6 May meete againe, and each take happy chaunce.”7 This said, they both a furlongs mountenaunce8 Retird their steeds, to ronne in even race: But Braggadochio with his bloody launce Once having turnd, no more returnd9 his face, But lefte his love to losse, and fled him selfe apace.10

19

The knight him seeing flie, had no regard11 Him to poursew, but to the lady rode, And having her from Trompart lightly12 reard, Upon his Courser sett the lovely lode, And with her fled away without abode.13 Well weened he, that fairest Florimell

1

light: unimportant. that: that which. 3 els: elsewhere. 4 needes thou wilt: necessarily you will. 2

5

proofe: trial. 6 tilt: jousting (running at each other on horseback, with lances pointing forward). 7 happy chaunce: whatever fortune happens to bring.

8

furlongs mountenaunce: the measure of a furlong, about one-eighth of a mile; loosely used to mean “a short way.” 9 returnd: turned back. 10

apace: speedily. regard: inclination; interest. 12 lightly: easily; deftly. 13 abode: delay. 11

Canto Eight

157

It was, with whom in company he yode,1 And so her selfe did alwaies to him tell; So made him thinke him selfe in heven, that was in hell. 20

But Florimell her selfe was far away, Driven to great distresse by fortune straunge, And taught the carefull Mariner to play,2 Sith late mischaunce3 had her compeld to chaunge The land for sea, at randon there to raunge:4 Yett there that cruell Queene5 avengeresse, Not satisfyde so far her to estraunge From courtly blis and wonted happinesse, Did heape on her new waves of weary wretchednesse.

21

For being fled into the fishers bote, For refuge from the Monsters cruelty, Long so she on the mighty maine did flote, And with the tide drove forward carelesly, For th’ayre was milde, and cleared was the skie, And all his windes Dan Aeolus6 did keepe, From stirring up their stormy enmity, As pittying to see her waile and weepe; But all the while the fisher did securely sleepe.

22

At last when droncke with drowsinesse, he woke, And saw his drover drive along the streame,7 He was dismayd, and thrise his breast he stroke, For marveill of that accident extreame; But when he saw, that blazing beauties beame, Which with rare light his bote did beautifye, He marveild more, and thought he yet did dreame Not well awakte, or that some extasye8 Assotted9 had his sence, or dazed was his eye.

1

yode: went. I.e., fortune had taught her to put on the role of mariner (when she jumped into the little boat to escape the hyena (vii.27). 3 mischaunce: misfortune. 4 randon: random; raunge: drift; wander. 5 I.e., Fortune. 2

6

Dan: courtesy title for a male member of a religious order or for a male scholar, knight, poet, or deity; Aeolus: a god of the winds, who sometimes keeps them shut up in his cave. 7 drover: fishing boat; streame: current. 8 extasye: trance; temporary condition of being out of touch with reality. 9 Assotted: befooled; infatuated.

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23

But when her well avizing, hee perceiv’d To be no vision, nor fantasticke1 sight, Great comfort of her presence he conceiv’d, And felt in his old corage2 new delight To gin awake, and stir his frosen spright:3 Tho rudely askte her, how she thether came. “Ah” (sayd she) “father I note read aright, What hard misfortune brought me to this same; Yet am I glad that here I now in safety ame.

24

“But thou good man, sith far in sea we bee, And the great waters gin apace to swell,4 That now no more we can the mayn-land see, Have care, I pray, to guide the cock-bote5 well, Least worse on sea then us on land befell.” Thereat th’old man did nought but fondly6 grin, And saide, his boat the way could wisely tell: But his deceiptfull eyes did never lin,7 To looke on her faire face, and marke8 her snowy skin.

25

The sight whereof 9 in his congealed flesh, Infixt such secrete sting of greedy lust, That the drie withered stocke10 it gan refresh, And kindled heat, that soone in flame forth brust: The driest wood is soonest burnt to dust. Rudely to her he lept, and his rough hand Where ill became him, rashly would have thrust, But she with angry scorne him did withstond, And shamefully reprov’d for his rudenes fond.

1

fantasticke: produced by fantasy; imaginary. 2 corage: spirit, with a pun on sexual powers. 3 frosen spright: according to sixteenthcentury medical knowledge, a man’s semen contained spirits which needed heat to stir themselves. 4 Florimell does not realize that the fisher will hear a bawdy double meaning in her words; his “waters” are also beginning to swell.

5 cock-bote: very small, light boat. According to the OED, the first recorded use of “cock” to mean “penis” was in 1618 (sb120), so Spenser may or may not be punning here. 6 fondly: foolishly. 7 lin: leave off, cease. 8 marke: take note of. 9 whereof: of which. 10 stocke: anyone or anything devoid of sensation, such as a stick of wood (with implied allusion to the penis); trunk of the body; progenitor.

Canto Eight

26

But he, that never good nor maners knew, Her sharpe rebuke full litle did esteeme; Hard is to teach an old horse amble trew. The inward smoke, that did before but steeme, Broke into open fire and rage1 extreme, And now he strength gan adde unto his will, Forcying to doe, that2 did him fowle misseeme: Beastly he threwe her downe, ne car’d to spill3 Her garments gay with scales of fish,4 that all did fill.

27

The silly5 virgin strove him to withstand, All that she might, and him in vaine revild: Shee strugled strongly both with foote and hand, To save her honor from that villaine vilde, And cride to heven, from humane helpe exild. O ye brave knights, that boast this Ladies love, Where be ye now, when she is nigh defild Of filthy wretch? well may she you reprove Of falsehood or of slouth, when most it may behove.6

28

But if that thou, Sir Satyran, didst weete, Or thou, Sir Peridure,7 her sory state, How soone would yee assemble many a fleete, To fetch from sea, that8 ye at land lost late; Towres, citties, kingdomes ye would ruinate,9 In your avengement and dispiteous10 rage, Ne ought11 your burning fury mote abate; But if Sir Calidore could it presage,12 No living creature could his cruelty asswage.

1

rage: sexual fury. that: that which. 3 ne car’d to spill: nor cared whether he spoiled. 4 I.e., “spill . . . with scales of fish” (her gay garments are spoiled by being smeared with fish scales). 5 silly: defenceless. 6 I.e., when it would be most appropriate for you to help her. 2

7

159

Sir Peridure: mentioned briefly in the chronicle of British kings in Book Two; otherwise, he does not appear in the poem (II.x.44.9). 8 that: that which. 9 ruinate: lay waste. 10 dispiteous: lacking pity, merciless. 11 ought: aught, anything. 12 presage: feel a foreboding about; predict intuitively.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Three

29

But sith that none of all her knights is nye, See how the heavens of voluntary grace, And soveraine favor towards chastity, Doe succor send to her distressed cace: So much high God doth innocence embrace. It fortuned, whilest thus she stifly1 strove, And the wide sea importuned2 long space With shrilling shriekes, Proteus3 abrode did rove, Along the fomy waves driving his finny drove.

30

Proteus is Shepheard of the seas of yore, And hath the charge of Neptunes mighty heard,4 An aged sire with head all frowy hore,5 And sprinckled frost upon his deawy beard: Who when those pittifull outcries he heard, Through all the seas so ruefully resownd, His charett6 swifte in hast he thether steard, Which with a teeme of scaly Phocas7 bownd Was drawne upon the waves, that fomed him arownd.

31

And comming to that Fishers wandring bote, That went at will, withouten card8 or sayle, He therein saw that yrkesome sight, which smote Deepe indignation and compassion frayle9 Into his hart attonce: streight did he hayle The greedy villein from his hoped pray, Of which he now did very litle fayle,10 And with his staffe, that drives his heard astray, Him bett so sore, that life and sence did much dismay.

32

The whiles the pitteous Lady up did ryse, Ruffled and fowly raid11 with filthy soyle, And blubbred12 face with teares of her faire eyes:

1

6

2

7

stifly: resolutely. I.e., pleaded to the wide sea. 3 Proteus: see Argument, note. 4 Neptunes: belonging to the chief god of the ocean; heard: herd (of fish). 5 frowy: dank; perhaps an error for “frory,” meaning “frosty” or “frothy,” as at 35.2; hore: hoary, greyish-white (hair) or covered with frost.

charett: chariot. Phocas: seals. 8 at will: in the manner of lust on the loose; card: chart or compass card. 9 frayle: tender. 10 I.e., the fisher was very short of succeeding in taking possession of her. 11 raid: smeared (OED “ray” v25). 12 blubbred: swollen with weeping.

Canto Eight

161

Her heart nigh broken was with weary toyle, To save her selfe from that outrageous spoyle, But when she looked up, to weet, what wight Had her from so infamous fact assoyld,1 For shame, but more for feare of his grim sight, Downe in her lap she hid her face, and lowdly shright.2 33

Herselfe not saved yet from daunger dredd She thought, but chaung’d from one to other feare; Like as a fearefull partridge, that is fledd From the sharpe hauke, which her attached neare,3 And fals to ground, to seeke for succor theare, Whereas the hungry Spaniells she does spye, With greedy jawes her ready for to teare; In such distresse and sad perplexity Was Florimell, when Proteus she did see her by.

34

But he endevored with speaches milde Her to recomfort, and accourage bold,4 Bidding her feare no more her foeman vilde, Nor doubt himselfe; and who he was her told. Yet all that could not from affright her hold, Ne to recomfort her at all prevayld; For her faint hart was with the frosen cold Benumbd so inly, that her wits nigh fayld, And all her sences with abashment quite were quayld.

35

Her up betwixt his rugged hands he reard, And with his frory lips full5 softly kist, Whiles the cold ysickles from his rough beard, Dropped adowne upon her yvory brest: Yet he him selfe so busily addrest,6 That her out of astonishment7 he wrought, And out of that same fishers filthy nest Removing her, into his charet brought, And there with many gentle termes her faire besought.8

1

5

2

6

assoyld: released. shright: shrieked. 3 attached neare: nearly seized. 4 accourage bold: boldy take heart.

frory: frosty; frothy; full: very, quite. addrest: applied. 7 astonishment: stunned condition; stupor. 8 besought: entreated; attempted to gain.

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

162 36

But that old leachour,1 which with bold assault That beautie durst presume to violate, He cast to punish for his hainous fault; Then tooke he him yet trembling sith of late, And tyde behind his charet, to aggrate2 The virgin, whom he3 had abusde so sore: So drag’d him through the waves in scornfull state, And after cast him up, upon the shore; But Florimell with him unto his bowre he bore.

37

His bowre is in the bottom of the maine, Under a mightie rocke, gainst which doe rave The roring billowes in their proud disdaine, That with the angry working of the wave, Therein is eaten out an hollow cave, That seemes rough Masons hand with engines keene Had long while laboured it to engrave: There was his wonne, ne living wight was seene, Save one old Nymph, hight Panope to keepe it cleane.

38

Thether he brought the sory Florimell, And entertained4 her the best he might And Panope her entertaind eke well, As an immortall mote a mortall wight, To winne her liking unto his delight: With flattering wordes he sweetly wooed her, And offered faire guiftes, t’allure her sight, But she both offers and the offerer Despysde, and all the fawning of the flatterer.

39

Dayly he tempted her with this or that, And never suffred5 her to be at rest: But evermore she him refused flat, And all his fained kindnes did detest. So firmely she had sealed up her brest. Sometimes he boasted, that a God he hight:

1

4

2

5

I.e., the fisher. aggrate: please. 3 he: the fisher.

entertained: treated. suffred: allowed.

Canto Eight

163

But she a mortall creature loved best: Then he would make him selfe a mortall wight; But then she said she lov’d none, but a Faery knight. 40

Then like a Faerie knight him selfe he drest; For every shape on him he could endew:1 Then like a king he was to her exprest,2 And offred kingdoms unto her in vew, To be his Leman3 and his Lady trew: But when all this he nothing saw prevaile, With harder meanes he cast her to subdew, And with sharpe threates her often did assayle, So thinking for to make her stubborne corage quayle.

41

To dreadfull shapes he did him selfe transforme, Now like a Gyaunt, now like to a feend, Then like a Centaure,4 then like to a storme, Raging within the waves: thereby he weend Her will to win unto his wished eend.5 But when with6 feare, nor favour, nor with all He els could doe, he saw him selfe esteemd, Downe in a Dongeon deepe he let her fall, And threatned there to make her his eternall thrall.

42

Eternall thraldome was to her more liefe,7 Then losse of chastitie, or chaunge of love:8 Dye had she rather in tormenting griefe, Then any should of falseness9 her reprove, Or loosenes, that she lightly did remove.10 Most vertuous virgin, glory be thy meed, And crowne of heavenly prayse with Saintes above, Where most sweet hymmes of this thy famous deed Are still emongst them song, that far my rymes exceed.11

1

endew: endue, put on. exprest: manifested; represented, portrayed. 3 Leman: beloved; paramour, mistress. 4 Centaure: half man, half horse, and known for lust. 5 eend: end, goal. 6 with: neither with. 2

7

more liefe: preferable. Cf. Belphoebe’s resolute chastity in the face of Timias’ need. 9 falseness: infidelity. 10 remove: i.e., remove her affections from one man to transfer them to another. 11 I.e., that far exceed my rhymes. 8

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43

Fit song of Angels caroled to bee, But yet what so1 my feeble Muse can frame, Shalbe t’advance2 thy goodly chastitee, And to enroll3 thy memorable name, In th’heart of every honourable4 Dame, That they thy vertuous deedes may imitate, And be partakers of thy endlesse fame. Yt yrkes me, leave thee in this wofull state,5 To tell of Satyrane, where I him left of late.

44

Who having ended with that Squyre of Dames A long discourse of his adventures vayne,6 The which himselfe, then Ladies more defames, And finding not th’Hyena to be slayne,7 With that same Squyre, retourned back agayne To his first way.8 And as they forward went, They spyde a knight fayre pricking9 on the playne, As if he were on some adventure bent, And in his port10 appeared manly hardiment.

45

Sir Satyrane him towardes did addresse, To weet, what wight he was, and what his quest: And comming nigh, eftsoones he gan to gesse Both by the burning hart, which on his brest He bare,11 and by the colours in his crest, That Paridell 12 it was. Tho to him yode, And him saluting, as beseemed best, Gan first inquire of tydinges13 farre abrode; And afterwardes, on what adventure now he rode.

1

what so: whatever. advance: praise publicly, extol. 3 enroll: record as a way of honoring. 4 When applied to a woman, the word “honorable” means “chaste and faithful.” 5 I.e., it irks me to leave you in this woeful condition. The poem’s speaker is being wide-eyed with innocence, again (cf. 1.6.n.). 6 vayne: useless, i.e., the Squire of Dames’ search for chaste women. 2

7

to be slayne: to slay it. his first way: his original quest (see vii.30). 9 pricking: spurring his horse onward. 10 port: carriage of himself. 11 I.e., he bore a representation of a burning heart on the front of his tunic. 12 See Arg.4.n. 13 tydinges: news. 8

Canto Eight

46

Who thereto answering, said, “The tydinges bad, Which now in Faery court all men doe tell, Which turned hath great mirth, to mourning sad, Is the late ruine of proud Marinell, And suddein parture1 of faire Florimell, To find him forth: and after her are gone All the brave knightes, that doen2 in armes excell, To savegard3 her, ywandred all alone; Emongst the rest my lott (unworthy) is to be one.”

47

“Ah gentle knight” (said then Sir Satyrane) “Thy labour all is lost, I greatly dread, That hast a thanklesse service on thee ta’ne, And offrest sacrifice unto the dead: For dead, I surely doubt,4 thou maist aread Henceforth for ever Florimell to bee, That all the noble knights of Maydenhead,5 Which her ador’d, may sore repent6 with mee, And all faire Ladies may for ever sory bee.”

48

Which wordes when Paridell had heard, his hew Gan greatly chaung and seemd dismaid to bee, Then said, “Fayre Sir, how may I weene it trew, That7 ye doe tell in such uncerteintee? Or speake ye of report,8 or did ye see Just9 cause of dread, that makes ye doubt so sore? For perdie elles10 how mote it ever bee, That ever hand should dare for to engore Her noble blood? the hevens such crueltie abhore.”

1

parture: departure. doen: do. 3 savegard: safeguard. 4 doubt: fear. 5 knights of Maydenhead: an order of knights invented by Spenser to serve Gloriana, in a tribute to the actual Knights of the Garter, who served the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth. As in the Elizabethan court, the political relationship of Gloriana to her knights 2

165

is articulated in the same sorts of terms as those used by a chaste Petrarchan mistress and her suitors, even when the knights are actually in love with other women. 6

repent: mourn; regret; feel guilty about. That: that which. 8 report: rumor. 9 Just: reliable. 10 elles: otherwise. 7

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49

“These eyes did see, that they will ever1 rew To have seene,” (quoth he) “when as a monstrous beast The Palfrey, whereon she did travell, slew, And of his bowels made his bloody feast: Which speaking token2 sheweth at the least Her certeine losse, if not her sure decay: Besides, that more suspicion encreast, I found her golden girdle cast astray, Distaynd with durt and blood, as relique3 of the pray.”

50

“Ay me,” (said Paridell) “the signes be sadd, And but God turne the same to good sooth say,4 That Ladies safetie is sore to be dradd: Yet will I not forsake my forward way, Till triall5 doe more certeine truth bewray.” “Faire Sir” (quoth he) “well may it you succeed, Ne long shall Satyrane behind you stay, But to the rest, which6 in this Quest proceed My labour adde, and be partaker of their speed.”7

51

“Ye noble knights” (said then the Squyre of Dames) “Well may yee speede in so praiseworthy payne: But sith the Sunne now ginnes to slake his beames, In deawy vapours of the westerne mayne, And lose the teme out of his weary wayne,8 Mote not mislike you9 also to abate Your zealous hast, till morrow next againe Both light of heven, and strength of men relate:10 Which if ye please, to yonder castle turne your gate.”

52

That counsell pleased well; so all yfere11 Forth marched to a Castle them before, Where soone arryving, they restrained were

1

7

2

8

that: that which; ever: always. speaking token: significant sign. 3 Distaynd: defiled; relique: relic, venerated token; remnant. 4 I.e., unless God turns these signs (most specifically, this sash) into a good omen. 5 triall: direct experience. 6 which: who.

speed: success; speed. I.e., unharness the team of horses that draw the wain—the wagon—of the Sun. 9 Mote not mislike you: may it not displease you. 10 relate: restore. 11 yfere: in a friendly company.

Canto Eight

167

Of ready entraunce, which ought evermore To errant knights be commune:1 wondrous sore Thereat displeasd they were, till that young Squyre Gan them informe the cause, why that same dore Was shut to all, which2 lodging did desyre: The which to let you weet, will further time requyre.

1 In a world with very few inns, it was expected that respectable-looking strangers should be able to knock on the door of any

house but the most poverty-stricken and be given food and shelter for the night. 2 which: who.

Canto Nine Malbecco1 will no straunge knights host, For peevish 2 gealosy: Paridell giusts3 with Britomart: both shew their auncestry.

1

Redoubted4 knights, and honorable Dames, To whom I levell5 all my labours end, Right sore I feare, least with unworthie blames This odious argument my rymes should shend,6 Or ought7 your goodly patience offend, Whiles of a wanton Lady I doe write, Which with her loose incontinence doth blend8 The shyning glory of your soveraine light, And knighthood fowle defaced by a faithlesse knight.

2

But never let th’ensample of the bad Offend the good: for good by paragone9 Of evill, may more notably be rad,10 As white seemes fayrer, macht with blacke attone;11 Ne all are shamed by the fault of one: For lo in heven, whereas12 all goodnes is, Emongst the Angels, a whole legione13 Of wicked Sprightes did fall from happy blis;14 What wonder then, if one of women all did mis?15

1 Malbecco: Latin malus (bad) + Italian becco (male goat; cuckold). 2 peevish: senseless; insane; spiteful; perverse; morose. 3 giusts: jousts. 4 Redoubted: respected. 5 levell: direct. 6 argument: subject; rymes: poetry; shend: shame. 7 ought: at all. 8 blend: dilute; obscure.

9

paragone: comparison. rad: (form of “read”) understood; perceived. 11 macht: matched; attone: together. 12 whereas: where. 13 legione: vast number in a mass; army. 14 The fallen angels who conspired with Satan to overthrow God were punished by being thrown out of heaven. 15 mis: err; sin. 10

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Canto Nine

3

Then listen Lordings,1 if ye list to weet The cause, why Satyrane and Paridell Mote not be entertaynd,2 as seemed meet, Into that Castle (as that Squyre does tell.) “Therein a cancred crabbed Carle3 does dwell, That has no skill of Court nor courtesie,4 Ne cares, what men say of him ill or well; For all his dayes he drownes in privitie,5 Yet has full large6 to live, and spend at libertie.

4

“But all his mind is set on mucky pelfe,7 To hoord up heapes of evill gotten masse, For which he others wrongs and wreckes himselfe; Yet is he lincked to a lovely lasse, Whose beauty doth her bounty far surpasse, The which to him both far unequall yeares,8 And also far unlike conditions has; For she does joy to play emongst her peares,9 And to be free from hard restraynt and gealous feares.

5

“But he is old, and withered like hay, Unfit faire Ladies service10 to supply, The privie guilt whereof makes him alway

1

Having warned that the subject matter will be racy, the speaker is no longer inviting women to listen—yet the chief audience presumed by the poem is always Elizabeth. There has been quite racy subject matter in the poem before this point, of course. Perhaps by the time he was writing these lines, Spenser had already begun to receive the criticism to which he will allude at the beginning of the 1596 edition (IV.Pr); but it is just as likely that these stanzas here in Book Three are humorously arch. 2 entertaynd: courteously admitted. 3 cancred crabbed Carle: churlish churlish churl. The c’s emphasize his constipated disposition. 4 skill: knowledge; courtesie: see vi.1.6.n.

169

5 privitie: seclusion; secret plans; personal affairs—with puns on “intimacy,” “private parts,” and “the legal bond of marriage,” and with an oblique invocation of “privation.” All of these are significant for Malbecco’s story. 6 large: largesse, bounty (normally designating the quality of being bountiful; here designating merely the financial potential to be so). 7 mucky: filthy; pelfe: money; property; stolen goods—with additional resonance from the meaning “rubbish.” 8 I.e., they are of very different ages. 9 peares: peers. 10 service: sexual servicing, a subject on which the Squire of Dames is something of an authority (see vii.53–55).

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Suspect her truth,1 and keepe continuall spy Upon her with his other blincked eye;2 Ne suffreth he resort3 of living wight Approch to her, ne keepe her company, But in close bowre her mewes4 from all mens sight, Depriv’d of kindly5 joy and naturall delight. 6

“Malbecco he, and Hellenore6 she hight, Unfitly yokt together in one teeme,7 That is the cause, why never any knight Is suffred here to enter, but he seeme Such, as no doubt of him he neede misdeeme.”8 Thereat Sir Satyrane gan smyle, and say; “Extremely mad9 the man I surely deeme, That weenes with watch and hard restraynt to stay10 A womans will, which is disposd to go astray.11

7

“In vaine he feares that, which he cannot shonne: For who wotes not, that womans subtiltyes Can guylen Argus,12 when she list misdonne? It is not yron bandes, nor hundred eyes, Nor brasen walls, nor many wakefull spyes, That can withhold her wilfull wandring feet,

1

Suspect her truth: be suspicious about her chastity (i.e., her possible loss of it). 2 I.e., his one eye or his left eye, which is partly blinded or subject to blinking. 3 suffreth: allows; resort: company; access. 4 mewes: pens up. 5 kindly: natural. 6 Malbecco: see Arg.1.n.; Hellenore: a name evoking Helen of Troy; Fowler suggests that Elizabethans might have heard “Helenwhore” (Fowler 1959, 585, n. 3). 7 teeme: team, as of oxen. 8 doubt: fear; suspicion; misdeeme: suspect. 9 mad: crazed. 10 stay: restrain. 11 It was believed that women’s cold, moist humors and unstable wombs (which could

wander about inside their bodies if diseased and which, in any case, were influenced by the changeable moon) made them inherently disposed to err morally and kept them from establishing firm lines of thought or firm purposes. See also vi.8.5.n. 12 guylen: beguile; hoodwink; Argus: in Greek mythology, a giant with a hundred eyes, only two of which slept at any given time. Juno was jealous of Jove’s current inamorata and rape victim, the beautiful Io, so Jove changed Io into a white heifer. Juno set Argus to guard Io with his hundred eyes, keeping her miserably lonely. Taking pity on Io, Mercury played his pipe to Argus until all hundred eyes were lulled asleep; then Mercury cut off Argus’ head, and Juno put the giant’s eyes into a peacock’s tail (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 1.583–723).

Canto Nine

171

But fast goodwill with gentle courtesyes, And timely service to her pleasures meet May her perhaps containe, that else would algates fleet.”1 8

“Then is he not more mad” (sayd Paridell) “That hath himselfe unto such service sold, In dolefull thraldome all his dayes to dwell? For sure a foole I doe him firmely hold, That loves his fetters, though they were of gold. But why doe wee devise of 2 others ill, Whyles thus we suffer this same dotard3 old, To keepe us out, in scorne of his owne will, And rather do not ransack all, and him selfe kill?”4

9

“Nay let us first” (sayd Satyrane) “entreat The man by gentle meanes, to let us in, And afterwardes affray5 with cruell threat, Ere that we to efforce it doe begin: Then if all fayle, we will by force it win, And eke reward the wretch for his mesprise,6 As may be worthy of his haynous sin.” That counsell pleasd: then Paridell did rise, And to the Castle gate approcht in quiet wise.

10

Whereat soft knocking, entrance he desyrd. The good man selfe, which then the Porter playd,7 Him answered, that all were now retyrd Unto their rest, and all the keyes convayd Unto their maister, who in bed was layd, That none him durst awake out of his dreme; And therefore them of patience gently prayd. Then Paridell began to chaunge his theme, And threatned him with force and punishment extreme.

1

fleet: flee. devise of: converse about. 3 dotard: senile person. 4 As usual, Paridell is impetuous and hotheaded. 5 affray: frighten. 2

6

mesprise: mistake; offense; contempt; failure to recognize someone’s worth. 7 good man: head of the household; the Porter playd: i.e., Malbecco pretended to be his own porter, coming to answer the door.

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11

But all in vaine; for nought mote him relent, And now so long before the wicket fast1 They wayted, that the night was forward2 spent, And the faire welkin3 fowly overcast, Gan blowen up a bitter stormy blast, With showre and hayle so horrible and dred, That this faire many4 were compeld at last, To fly for succour5 to a little shed, The which beside the gate for swyne was ordered.6

12

It fortuned, soone after they were gone, Another knight, whom tempest thether brought, Came to that Castle, and with earnest mone, Like as the rest, late entrance deare7 besought; But like so as the rest he prayd for nought, For flatly he of entrance was refusd. Sorely thereat he was displeasd, and thought How to avenge himselfe so sore abusd, And evermore the Carle of courtesie accusd.8

13

But to avoyde th’intollerable stowre,9 He was compeld to seeke some refuge neare, And to that shed, to shrowd him from the showre, He came, which full of guests he found whyleare,10 So as he was not let to enter there:11 Whereat he gan to wex exceeding wroth, And swore, that he would lodge with them yfere, Or them dislodg, all were they liefe or loth;12 And so defyde them each, and so defyde them both.13

1

wicket fast: locked gate. forward: far. 3 welkin: sky. 4 faire many: worthy group. 5 succour: refuge. 2

6

swyne: swine; ordered: placed. deare: dearly, earnestly. 8 I.e., accused him in the name of courtesy. 9 stowre: storm. 10 whyleare: modifies “full”; the pigsty was filled previous to his coming. 7

11

let: allowed. Although the pigsty is already filled with Paridell, Satyrane, and their two horses, these two knights are, in their own way, being as inhospitable as Malbecco. A certain grumpiness pervades this entire canto, undercutting all of the knights’ accustomed dignity, including that of the stranger soaking in the rain. 12 liefe or loth: willing or not. 13 The repetition emphasizes the humor of the stranger’s not being satisfied with one all-encompassing oath, instead furiously breaking the imprecation down into subheadings.

Canto Nine

14

Both were full loth to leave that needfull tent,1 And both full loth in darkenesse to debate; Yet both full liefe2 him lodging to have lent, And both full liefe his boasting to abate;3 But chiefely Paridell his hart did grate,4 To heare him threaten so despightfully, As if he did a dogge in kenell rate,5 That durst not barke; and rather had he dy, Then when he was defyde, in coward corner ly.

15

Tho hastily remounting to his steed, He forth issew’d; like as a boystrous winde, Which in th’earthes hollow caves hath long ben hid, And shut up fast within her prisons blind, Makes the huge element against her kinde6 To move, and tremble as it were aghast, Untill that it an issew forth may finde; Then forth it breakes, and with his furious blast Confounds both land and seas, and skyes doth overcast.7

16

Their steel-hed speares they strongly coucht, and met Together with impetuous rage and forse, That with the terrour of their fierce affret,8 They rudely9 drove to ground both man and horse,

1

Again the description is droll: Paridell and Satyrane want to do a great deed by teaching the strange knight a lesson, but they would prefer not to have to do it in the rain. 2 liefe: either they are hypocritically assuring themselves, each other, or the strange knight that they would let him in if they could, or else this word is a mistake for “loath,” given the next line, 13.5, and all of 16. 3 abate: stop. 4 Paridell his: Paridell’s; grate: fret. 5 I.e., as if he taunted a dog in a kennel. 6 I.e., makes the huge earth, against her nature.

7

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After a rare earthquake had occurred in England in 1580, Gabriel Harvey and Spenser wrote to each other—and subsequently published—“Three proper wittie familiar Letters, lately passed betwene two Universitie men, touching the Earthquake in April last, and our English reformed Versifying.” Harvey opined that earthquakes resulted from a wind, shut up in the earth, breaking out violently in a “forcible Eruption, and strong breath” (Spenser 1912, 616). In that passage, as in the description of Paridell’s suddenly issuing from the pigsty, it is well to remember that “wind” was the most common Elizabethan word for “fart.” 8 affret: attack (a Spenserian neologism). 9 rudely: violently.

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That each awhile lay like a sencelesse corse.1 But Paridell sore brused with the blow, Could not arise, the counterchaunge to scorse,2 Till that young Squyre him reared from below; Then drew he his bright sword, and gan about him throw.3 17

But Satyrane forth stepping, did them stay And with faire treaty4 pacifide their yre; Then when they were accorded5 from the fray, Against that Castles Lord they gan conspire, To heape on him dew vengeaunce for his hire.6 They beene agreed, and to the gates they goe To burne the same with unquenchable fire, And that uncurteous Carle their commune foe To doe fowle death to die, or wrap in grievous woe.

18

Malbecco seeing them resolvd in deed To flame the gates, and hearing them to call For fire in earnest, ran with fearfull speed, And to them calling from the castle wall, Besought them humbly, him to beare with all,7 As ignorant of servants bad abuse, And slacke attendaunce unto straungers call.8 The knights were willing all things to excuse, Though nought belev’d, and entraunce late did not refuse.

19

They beene ybrought into a comely bowre,9 And servd of all things that mote needfull bee; Yet secretly their hoste did on them lowre,10 And welcomde more for feare, then charitee;

1

This would have been a common enough phenomenon on a late medieval battlefield: a knight in heavy armor who fell off his horse would have trouble getting to his feet on his own. Nonetheless, in the context of this passage, the image of Paridell and the stranger lying on their backs in the mud, staring dazedly at the sky because of an argument over a pigsty, is less than noble. 2 counterchaunge: requital; scorse: exchange.

3

throw: brandish. treaty: entreaty. 5 accorded: reconciled. 6 hire: reward, payback. 7 I.e., to bear with him. 8 Malbecco pretends that it was a servant rather than himself who previously denied them entrance. 9 comely bowre: handsome room. 10 lowre: lower, look gloomily. 4

Canto Nine

175

But they dissembled, what they did not see,1 And welcomed themselves. Each gan undight Their garments wett, and weary armour free, To dry them selves by Vulcanes flaming light,2 And eke their lately bruzed parts to bring in plight.3 20

And eke that straunger knight emongst the rest, Was for like need enforst to disaray: Tho whenas vailed was her4 lofty crest, Her golden locks, that were in tramells5 gay Upbounden, did them selves adowne display, And raught unto her heeles; like sunny beames, That in a cloud their light did long time stay, Their vapour vaded,6 shewe their golden gleames, And through the persant aire7 shoote forth their azure streames.

21

Shee also dofte her heavy haberjeon,8 Which the faire feature of her limbs did hyde, And her well plighted9 frock, which she did won To tucke about her short, when she did ryde, Shee low let fall, that flowd from her lanck10 syde Downe to her foot, with carelesse11 modestee. Then of them all she plainly was espyde, To be a woman wight, unwist to bee,12 The fairest woman wight, that ever eie did see.

1

I.e., they pretended not to notice that Malbecco’s hospitality was not genuine. 2 by Vulcanes flaming light: by the fire. Vulcan, the god of fire, was cuckolded by his wife, Venus. 3 in plight: into healthy condition. 4

vailed: removed; her: we find out that “he” is a “she” at the very moment when this fact is revealed to Paridell, Scudamour, and the others. Until now, Spenser has been using masculine pronouns for the stranger. 5 tramells: braids. 6 Their: the clouds’; vaded: dispersed.

7

persant aire: piercing air—though “piercing” may be a transferred epithet belonging more logically to the “sunny beames.” Alternatively, and more logically still, “persant” and “azure” may have been inadvertently switched by the compositor (a suggestion made by Collier in his gloss). 8

haberjeon: habergeon, chain-mail tunic. plighted: pleated. 10 lanck: slim. 11 carelesse: artless. 12 I.e, which they previously had not known. 9

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22

Like as Bellona,1 being late returnd From slaughter of the Giaunts conquered; Where proud Encelade, whose wide nosethrils2 burnd With breathed flames, like to a furnace redd, Transfixed with her speare, downe tombled dedd From top of Hemus,3 by him heaped hye; Hath loosd her helmet from her lofty hedd, And her Gorgonian4 shield gins to untye From her lefte arme, to rest in glorious victorye.

23

Which whenas they beheld, they smitten were With great amazement of so wondrous sight, And each on other, and they all on her Stood gazing, as if suddein great affright Had them surprizd. At last avizing right, Her goodly personage and glorious hew, Which they so much mistooke, they tooke delight In their first error, and yett still anew With wonder of her beauty fed their hongry vew.

24

Yet note5 their hongry vew be satisfide, But seeing still the more desir’d to see, And ever firmely fixed6 did abide In contemplation of divinitee: But most they mervaild at her chevalree, And noble prowesse, which they had approv’d,7 That much they faynd8 to know, who she mote bee; Yet none of all them her thereof amov’d, Yet every one her likte, and every one her lov’d.

1

Bellona: goddess of war, Minerva, whose picture of Medusa’s snaky head (or, in some versions, the head itself) on her breastplate or shield turned her male enemies into stone when they looked at it. 2 Encelade: one of Minerva’s opponents; nosethrils: nostrils. 3 Hemus: Mount Haemus. 4 Gorgonian: pertaining to the Gorgons, Medusa and her sisters. Britomart does not actually have Medusa on her shield, but her

chastity is gorgonian in its ability to keep men at a distance. Cf. i.46, where Britomart’s beauty attracts her admirers while her forbidding aspect makes them regret their interest. 5 note: could not. 6 Like the men who view Medusa’s head— except that here they do not die. 7 approv’d: tested, observed. 8 faynd: desired.

Canto Nine

25

And Paridell though partly discontent With his late fall, and fowle indignity,1 Yet was soone wonne his malice to relent, Through gratious regard of her faire eye, And knightly worth, which he too late did try, Yet tried did adore. Supper was dight; Then they Malbecco prayd of courtesy, That of his lady they might have the sight, And company at meat,2 to doe them more delight.

26

But he to shifte their curious request,3 Gan causen, why she could not come in place;4 Her crased5 helth, her late recourse to rest, And humid evening ill for sicke folkes cace, But none of those excuses could take place;6 Ne would they eate, till she in presence came. Shee came in presence with right comely grace, And fairely them saluted, as became,7 And shewd her selfe in all a gentle courteous Dame.

27

They sate to meat, and Satyrane his chaunce,8 Was her before, and Paridell beside; But he him selfe9 sate looking still askaunce, Gainst Britomart, and ever closely eide Sir Satyrane, that glaunces might not glide:10 But his blinde eie, that sided Paridell, All his demeasnure11 from his sight did hide: On her faire face so did he feede his fill, And sent close messages of love to her at will.12

1

indignity: although Paridell and the strange knight became friends at 17.3, Paridell’s anger renews at the embarrassing discovery that he was defeated by a woman. 2 at meat: at the meal. 3 shifte: sidestep; curious request: request asked out of curiosity. 4 causen: explain, give causes; in place: there. 5 crased: broken. 6 take place: find acceptance. 7 I.e., courteously kissed them, as was fitting (a common greeting for guests).

8

177

his chaunce: according to his lot. he him selfe: Malbecco. 10 Malbecco keeps a suspicious watch on Britomart as well as on Satyrane, fearing that anyone and everyone could seduce his wife. 11 demeasnure: demeanor, behavior. 12 close: secret. Because of Malbecco’s blind eye, he cannot keep watch on Paridell, who casts flirtatious glances in the direction of Malbecco’s wife. Thus this new Paris and new Helen stir up new trouble. 9

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28

And ever and anone, when none was ware,1 With speaking lookes, that close embassage2 bore, He rov’d3 at her, and told his secret care: For all that art he learned had of yore. Ne was she ignoraunt of that leud lore,4 But in his eye his meaning wisely redd, And with the like him aunswerd evermore: Shee sent at him one fyrie dart, whose hedd Empoisned was with privy lust, and gealous dredd.5

29

He from that deadly throw made no defence, But to the wound his weake heart opened wyde; The wicked engine through false influence,6 Past through his eies, and secretly did glyde Into his heart, which it did sorely gryde.7 But nothing new to him was that same paine, Ne paine at all; for he so ofte had tryde8 The powre thereof, and lov’d so oft in vaine, That thing of course9 he counted, love to entertaine.

30

Thenceforth to her he sought to intimate His inward griefe, by meanes to him well knowne, Now Bacchus fruit10 out of the silver plate He on the table dasht, as overthrowne, Or of the fruitfull liquor overflowne, And by the dauncing bubbles did divine,11 Or therein write to lett his love be showne; Which well she redd out of the learned line, A sacrament prophane in mistery of wine.12

1

ware: aware. embassage: messages. 3 rov’d: shot glances. 4 leud lore: knowledge of flirtation. 5 The dart causes the former in Paridell and the latter in Malbecco. 6 engine: tool; treachery; false influence: deceptive influx. 7 gryde: pierce through. 8 tryde: experienced. 9 of course: as a matter of course, as no surprise. The vivid and painful imagery of 2

fire, poison, and serious wounding here descends bathetically into no big deal; he is used to falling in love and knows how to be appropriately despairing. 10 Bacchus fruit: wine. Bacchus was the god of wine and revelry. 11 divine: discern; tell (someone’s) fortune. 12 They are playing a flirtatious game in which someone writes another person’s name in wine on the table. Castiglione and Harington—neither one of them categorically against games of love—had condemned this game as being sluttish

Canto Nine

31

And when so of his hand the pledge she raught,1 The guilty cup she fained to mistake,2 And in her lap did shed her idle draught,3 Shewing desire her inward flame to slake: By such close signes they secret way did make Unto their wils, and one eies watch4 escape; Two eies him needeth, for to watch and wake, Who lovers will deceive. Thus was the ape, By their faire handling, put into Malbeccoes cape.5

32

Now when of meats and drinks they had their fill, Purpose was moved6 by that gentle Dame, Unto those knights adventurous, to tell Of deeds of armes, which unto them became,7 And every one his kindred, and his name. Then Paridell, in whom a kindly8 pride Of gratious speach, and skill his words to frame9 Abounded, being yglad of so fitte tide10 Him to commend to her, thus spake, of al well eide.

33

“Troy, that art now nought, but an idle name, And in thine ashes buried low dost lie,11 Though whilome far much greater then thy fame, Before that angry Gods, and cruell skie Upon thee heapt a direfull destinie,12

(Hamilton, FQ III.ix.30.n.; Castiglione, 252; Harington, 12). 1 pledge: token, in the form of the cup of wine. Although one cup might properly be shared by two or more people who were only casual acquaintances, it was proper for the man to put the cup down onto the table and for the woman then to pick it up from the table, rather than taking it from his hand. 2 fained to mistake: feigned to fumble. 3 draught: drink. 4 one eies watch: i.e., observation by Malbecco’s one eye. 5 Apes were symbols of idiocy. If one spoke of putting an ape into a man’s hood, one meant that he was being tricked.

6

179

Purpose was moved: conversation was proposed. 7 became: was fitting; befell. 8 kindly: innate. 9 frame: compose. 10 tide: time; opportunity. 11 Paridell’s (and subsequently Britomart’s) history of the siege and fall of Troy is the third of three recountings of Britain’s history in The Faerie Queene; see iii.22.6.n., iii.26.2.n., and the following stanzas for information about Britain’s relationship to Troy. 12 Various gods and goddesses took sides in the war between the Greeks and the Trojans, sending aid to their favorites.

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What boots it boast thy glorious descent, And fetch from heven thy great genealogie, Sith all thy worthie prayses being blent,1 Their ofspring hath embaste, and later glory shent.2 34

“Most famous Worthy of the world,3 by whome That warre was kindled, which did Troy inflame, And stately towres of Ilion4 whilome Brought unto balefull ruine, was by name Sir Paris far renowmd through noble fame, Who through great prowesse and bold hardinesse, From Lacedaemon5 fetcht the fayrest Dame, That ever Greece did boast, or knight possesse, Whom Venus to him gave for meed of worthinesse.6

35

“Fayre Helene, flowre of beautie excellent, And girlond7 of the mighty Conquerours, That madest many Ladies deare lament The heavie losse of their brave Paramours, Which they far off beheld from Trojan toures, And saw the fieldes of faire Scamander8 strowne

1 blent: blemished (OED “blench” v2); polluted (OED “blend” v22). 2 embaste: made base; shent: disgraced. 3 The Nine Worthies were a specific list of heroes of the past (three pagans from the ancient world, three Jews, and three Christians), and Paris was not among them. Paridell elevates his ancestor beyond his deserts. 4 Ilion: Another name for Troy. 5 Lacedaemon: Sparta, in Greece. 6 According to the myth, the Goddess of Discord wrote “To the Fairest” on an apple and threw it among the guests attending the wedding of Peleus and Thetis. Juno, Minerva, and Venus each thought she deserved the apple, so they asked Paris, a mortal prince of Troy, to decide the matter. He chose Venus, after she promised to give him the most beautiful woman in the world as a reward. The most beautiful woman in the

world was Helen, wife of the Spartan king Menelaus, so Paris traveled to Greece, seduced Helen, and took her back to Troy. Menelaus called his fellow kings throughout Greece to mount an expedition to attack Troy. The siege of Troy lasted ten years, with the battle going one way and another, but finally the Greeks tricked the Trojans into pulling a gigantic, hollow wooden horse into the city. That night, Greek soldiers poured out of the hollow horse, opened the city gates, and burned Troy to the ground. Aeneas, another Trojan prince, escaped with members of his family and went on to establish the lineage that ultimately founded Rome and, generations later, London. (Although there may have been a Trojan war, the rest is fiction, but at least some of it was taken as fact in the sixteenth century.) 7 girlond: garland, i.e., crown. 8 Scamander: river of Troy.

Canto Nine

181

With carcases of noble warrioures, Whose fruitlesse lives were under furrow sowne, And Xanthus1 sandy bankes with blood all overflowne. 36

“From him my linage I derive aright,2 Who long before the ten yeares siege of Troy, Whiles yet on Ida3 he a shepeheard hight, On faire Oenone got4 a lovely boy, Whom for remembrance of her passed joy, She of his Father Parius did name; Who, after Greekes did Priams5 realme destroy, Gathred the Trojan reliques sav’d from flame, And with them sayling thence, to th’Isle of Paros came.

37

“That was by him cald Paros, which before Hight Nausa, there he many yeares did raine, And built Nausicle by the Pontick shore, The which he dying lefte next in remaine6 To Paridas his sonne.7 From whom I Paridell by kin descend; But for faire ladies love, and glories gaine, My native soile have lefte, my dayes to spend In seewing8 deeds of armes, my lives and labors end.”

38

Whenas the noble Britomart heard tell Of Trojan warres, and Priams citie sackt, The ruefull story of Sir Paridell, She was empassiond at that piteous9 act, With zelous envy of Greekes cruell fact,10 Against that nation, from whose race of old She heard, that she was lineally extract:11 For noble Britons sprong from Trojans bold, And Troynovant12 was built of old Troyes ashes cold.

1

Xanthus: the gods’ name for the above river. 2 aright: directly; legitimately. 3 Ida: Mount Ida. 4 Oenone: a nymph; got: begot. 5 Priam was King of Troy. 6 next in remaine: next in succession.

7

The line is unfinished—or intentionally short—in both the 1590 and 1596 editions. 8 seewing: pursuing. 9 piteous: pitiful, worthy of compassion. 10 fact: deed. 11 extract: descended. 12 Troynovant: New Troy, a popular nickname for London. See 34.9.n.

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39

Then sighing soft awhile, at last she thus: “O lamentable fall of famous towne, Which raignd so many yeares victorious, And of all Asie1 bore the soveraine crowne, In one sad night consumd, and throwen downe: What stony hart, that heares thy haplesse fate, Is not empierst with deepe compassiowne, And makes ensample2 of mans wretched state, That floures so fresh at morne, and fades at evening late?

40

“Behold, Sir, how your pitifull3 complaint Hath fownd another partner of your payne: For nothing may impresse so deare constraint,4 As countries cause, and commune foes disdayne. But if it should not grieve you, backe agayne To turne your course, I would to heare desyre, What to Aeneas fell;5 sith that men sayne He was not in the cities wofull fyre Consum’d, but did him selfe to safety retyre.”

41

“Anchyses sonne begott of Venus fayre,”6 Said he, “out of the flames for safegard fled, And with a remnant did to sea repayre,7 Where he through fatall errour8 long was led Full many yeares, and weetlesse wandered From shore to shore, emongst the Lybick9 sandes, Ere rest he fownd. Much there he suffered,10 And many perilles past in forreine landes, To save his people sad from victours vengefull handes.

1

9

2

10

Asie: Asia. makes ensample: takes as a cautionary example. 3 pitifull: compassionate. 4 deare constraint: great extremity. 5 fell: befell, happened. 6 Aeneas had a mortal father and an immortal mother. 7 repayre: go; take refuge. 8 fatall errour: fated wanderings—from fato profugus, “exiled by fate,” Aeneid, 1.2 (Hamilton, FQ III.ix.41–43.n.).

Lybick: Libyan. Paridell glosses over what happened in Libya: Aeneas, his former wife having died, fell in love with Queen Dido, who returned the passion with interest. After the gods told Aeneas he had to leave, since his duty lay in founding the Roman race, Aeneas tried to sneak away without telling Dido. She saw the preparations and immolated herself on a funeral pyre (Aeneid, IV).

Canto Nine

42

“At last in Latium1 he did arryve, Where he with cruell warre was entertaind2 Of th’inland folke, which sought him backe to drive, Till he with old Latinus3 was constraind, To contract wedlock: (so the fates ordaind.) Wedlocke contract in blood, and eke in blood Accomplished, that many deare complaind: The rivall slaine, the victour through the flood4 Escaped hardly, hardly praisd his wedlock good.

43

“Yet after all, he victour did survive, And with Latinus did the kingdom part. But after, when both nations gan to strive, Into their names the title to convart,5 His sonne Julus did from thence depart, With all the warlike youth of Trojans bloud, And in long Alba6 plast his throne apart, Where faire it florished, and long time stoud, Till Romulus7 renewing it, to Rome removd.”

44

“There there”8 (said Britomart) “a fresh appeard The glory of the later world to spring, And Troy againe out of her dust was reard, To sitt in second seat of soveraine king, Of all the world under her governing. But a third kingdom yet is to arise, Out of the Trojans scattered ofspring, That in all glory and great enterprise, Both first and second Troy shall dare to equalise.9

1

Latium: a region in Italy. entertaind: received. 3 Latinus: King of Latium, who made peace conditional upon a marriage between his daughter, Lavinia, and Aeneas. 4 rivall: Turnus, who also wanted Lavinia’s hand; flood: the battles between the two peoples, during which blood flowed. 5 I.e., to have the country named after them. 2

6

183

long Alba: Alba Longa, in Latium. Romulus: a descendant of Aeneas, more than three hundred years after the fall of Troy. 8 There there: not a soothing phrase but an expression of awe at what one has heard: Lo, lo! 9 equalise: match itself against; be the equal of. 7

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45

“It Troynovant is hight, that with the waves Of wealthy Thamis1 washed is along, Upon whose stubborne neck whereat he raves With roring rage, and sore him selfe does throng,2 That all men feare to tempt3 his billowes strong, She fastned hath her foot, which standes so hy,4 That it a wonder of the world is song In forreine landes, and all which passen by, Beholding it from farre, doe thinke it threates the skye.

46

“The Trojan Brute5 did first that citie fownd, And Hygate made the meare6 thereof by west, And Overt gate by North: that is the bownd7 Toward the land; two rivers bownd the rest. So huge a scope at first him seemed best, To be the compasse of his kingdomes seat: So huge a mind could not in lesser rest, Ne in small meares containe his glory great, That Albion8 had conquered first by warlike feat.”

47

“Ah fairest Lady knight,” (said Paridell) “Pardon I pray my heedlesse oversight, Who had forgot, that whylome I hard tell From aged Mnemon;9 for my wits beene light. Indeed he said (if I remember right,) That of the antique Trojan stocke, there grew Another plant, that raught to wondrous hight, And far abroad his mightie braunches threw, Into the utmost Angle10 of the world he knew.

1 Thamis: the Thames River, which runs through London. 2 throng: press. 3 tempt: attempt (to sail upon; few English of this period could swim, even in a calm pond). 4 I.e., the London Bridge, which had tall buildings constructed on it. 5 Brute: Brutus, legendary founder of the British race.

6 Hygate: a village supposed to have been intended by the Brute to be the location of the western gate of London; meare: boundary (OED “mere” sb21a). 7 bownd: boundary. 8 Albion: Britain. 9 Mnemon: “mindful” (Greek). 10 Angle: corner.

Canto Nine

48

“For that same Brute, whom much he did advaunce1 In all his speach, was Sylvius his2 sonne, Whom having slain, through luckles arrowes glaunce He fled for feare of that he had misdonne, Or els for shame, so fowle reproch to shonne, And with him ledd to sea an youthly trayne,3 Where wearie wandring they long time did wonne,4 And many fortunes prov’d in th’Ocean mayne, And great adventures found, that now were long to sayne.

49

“At last by fatall course5 they driven were Into an Island6 spatious and brode, The furthest North, that did to them appeare: Which after rest they seeking farre abrode, Found it the fittest soyle for their abode, Fruitfull of all thinges fitt for living foode, But wholy waste, and void of peoples trode,7 Save an huge nation of the Geaunts broode, That fed on living flesh, and dronck mens vitall blood.

50

“Whom he through wearie wars and labours long, Subdewd with losse of many Britons bold: In which the great Goemagot8 of strong Corineus, and Coulin of Debon old Were overthrowne, and laide on th’earth full cold, Which quaked under their so hideous masse, A famous history to bee enrold In everlasting moniments of brasse, That all the antique Worthies merits far did passe.

51

“His worke great Troynovant, his worke is eke Faire Lincolne,9 both renowmed far away, That who from East to West will endlong seeke, Cannot two fairer Cities find this day, Except Cleopolis:10 so heard I say

1

he: Mnemon; advance: praise. Sylvius his: Silvius’. 3 trayne: company. 4 wonne: live. 5 fatall course: fated route. 6 Island: Britain. 2

7

185

waste: deserted; trode: tread. Goemagot: a giant. 9 Lincolne: the English city. 10 Cleopolis: “City of Fame” (Greek). The Faerie Queen’s royal city and Spenser’s allegorical analogue for London. 8

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Old Mnemon. Therefore Sir,1 I greet you well Your countrey kin, and you entyrely pray Of pardon2 for the strife, which late befell Betwixt us both unknowne.”3 So ended Paridell. 52

But all the while, that he these speeches spent, Upon his lips hong faire Dame Hellenore, With vigilant regard, and dew attent,4 Fashioning worldes of fancies evermore In her fraile witt, that now her quite forlore:5 The whiles unwares away her wondring6 eye, And greedy eares her weake hart from her bore: Which he perceiving, ever privily In speaking, many false belgardes7 at her let fly.

53

So long these knightes discoursed diversly, Of straunge affaires, and noble hardiment, Which they had past with mickle8 jeopardy, That now the humid night was farforth spent, And hevenly lampes were halfendeale9 ybrent: Which th’old man seeing wel, who too long thought Every discourse and every argument, Which by the houres he measured, besought Them go to rest. So all unto their bowres10 were brought.

1

Sir: He is addressing Britomart, who has already revealed her sex by doffing her helmet and armor (stanzas 20 and 21). The OED gives one other example of the title’s being used unambiguously for a woman (“sir” sb 9), but the force of the title was almost certainly masculine. One addresses a knight as “Sir”; therefore Britomart deserves the title, yet it registers a certain amount of confusion on Paridell’s part as to whether he should be condescendingly gallant or genuinely respectful toward his interlocutor—who, lest we forget, began by unseating him from his horse.

2

I.e., I greet your fellow Britons (or kinfolks) well and entirely beg your pardon. 3 unknowne: i.e., when we were still strangers to each other. 4 attent: attention. 5 I.e., her intelligence, already weak, now completely forsook her. 6 wondring: with a pun on “wandering.” 7 belgardes: flirtatious looks. 8 mickle: much. 9 halfendeale: halfway. 10 bowres: bedrooms.

Canto Ten Paridell rapeth1 Hellenore: Malbecco her poursewes: Fynds emongst Satyres, whence with him To turne2 she doth refuse.

1

The morow next, so soone as Phœbus3 Lamp Bewrayed4 had the world with early light, And fresh Aurora5 had the shady damp Out of the goodly heven amoved quight, Faire Britomart and that same Faery knight6 Uprose, forth on their journey for to wend:7 But Paridell complaynd, that his late fight With Britomart, so sore did him offend,8 That ryde he could not, till his hurts he did amend.

2

1

So foorth they far’d, but he behind them stayd, Maulgre his host, who grudged9 grievously, To house a guest, that would be needes10 obayd, And of his owne him left not liberty: Might wanting measure moveth surquedry.11 Two things he feared, but the third was death; That fiers youngmans12 unruly maystery; His13 money, which he lov’d as living breath; And his faire wife, whom honest14 long he kept uneath.

rapeth: abducts; carries off. turne: return. 3 Phœbus: Apollo, in his role of the sun. 4 Bewrayed: revealed, with a pun on “covered with rays of light.” 5 Aurora: goddess of the dawn. 6 I.e., Satyrane. 7 wend: travel. 8 offend: hurt. 2

9

Maulgre: despite; grudged: griped. would be needes: must necessarily be. 11 I.e., when not restrained, power leads to presumption (e.g., a guest who is too pampered may presume to seduce the lady of the house). 12 I.e., Paridell’s. 13 His: Malbecco’s. 14 honest: chaste. 10

187

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3

But patience perforce he must abie,1 What fortune and his fate on him will lay, Fond is the feare, that findes no remedie; Yet warily he watcheth every way, By which he feareth evill happen may: So th’evill thinkes by watching to prevent; Ne doth he suffer her, nor night, nor day, Out of his sight her selfe once to absent. So doth he punish her and eke himselfe torment.

4

But Paridell kept better watch, then hee, A fit occasion for his turne2 to finde: False love, why do men say, thou canst not see, And in their foolish fancy feigne thee blinde, That with thy charmes the sharpest sight doest binde, And to thy will abuse? Thou walkest free, And seest every secret of the minde; Thou seest all, yet none at all sees thee; All that is by the working of thy Deitee.3

5

So perfect in that art was Paridell, That he Malbeccoes halfen eye did wyle,4 His halfen eye he wiled wondrous well, And Hellenors both eyes did eke beguyle, Both eyes and hart attonce, during the whyle That he there sojourned his woundes to heale, That Cupid selfe it seeing, close did smyle, To weet how he her love away did steale, And bad,5 that none their joyous treason should reveale.

6

The learned lover6 lost no time nor tyde, That least avantage mote to him afford, Yet bore so faire a sayle, that none espyde

1

abie: endure. Imagine a semicolon after “perforce.” 2 turne: purpose. 3 thy Deitee: thy divinity; thy god (Cupid or Venus). 4 halfen eye: half his eyesight; his one halfgood eye (see ix.5.5); wyle: beguile, trick.

5

bad: bade. learned lover: sixteenth-century moral pamphlets were filled with warnings to innocent young women to beware the wiles of men who were experienced in the methods of seduction. 6

Canto Ten

189

His secret drift, till he her layd abord.1 When so in open place, and commune bord,2 He fortun’d her to meet, with commune speach He courted her, yet bayted3 every word, That his ungentle hoste n’ote him appeach Of vile ungentlenesse, or hospitages breach.4 7

But when apart5 (if ever her apart) He found, then his false engins fast he plyde, And all the sleights6 unbosomd in his hart; He sigh’d, he sobd, he swownd, he perdy dyde,7 And cast himselfe on ground her fast besyde: Tho when againe he him bethought8 to live, He wept, and wayld, and false laments belyde,9 Saying, but if 10 she Mercie would him give That he mote algates dye, yet did his death forgive.11

8

And otherwhyles with amorous delights, And pleasing toyes12 he would her entertaine, Now singing sweetly, to surprize her sprights, Now making layes13 of love and lovers paine, Bransles, Ballads, virelayes,14 and verses vaine; Oft purposes,15 oft riddles he devysd,

1

drift: purpose (and drifting on the water—and drifting morally); layd abord: literally “brought (her) aboard.” Men spoke of “boarding” women when making bawdy jokes. The marine imagery in these four lines parodies the more innocent (though painful) imagery in Petrarchan sonnets, in which speakers continually complain about being lost on the stormy seas of love with only the beloved’s eyes to guide the boat to port. 2 commune bord: table at which everyone sat to eat together. 3 bayted: bated (moderated—in this case, slyly); baited (i.e., spoke in terms that seemed innocent but were designed to draw her in). 4 I.e., a breach of hospitality. 5 apart: i.e., away from everyone else. 6 sleights: deceitful strategies.

7

he perdy dyde: he died, by God (or, only slightly less hilariously, “he assuredly died”). This is a Chaucerian bit of humor about the extreme declarations found in the mouths of lovers in the Courtly Love tradition. 8 he him bethought: he reminded himself; he resolved. 9 belyde: faked. 10 but if: unless. 11 I.e., he would forgive her for causing his death. 12 toyes: foolishness; games. 13 layes: songs. 14 Bransles: songs for dance music; virelayes: songs of a particular type developed in France two centuries before, with short lines and simple rhyme schemes. 15 purposes: flirtatious question-and-answer games.

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And thousands like, which flowed in his braine, With which he fed her fancy, and entysd To take with his new love, and leave her old despysd. 9

And every where he might, and everie while He did her service dewtifull, and sewd1 At hand with humble pride, and pleasing guile, So closely yet, that none but she it vewd, Who well perceived all, and all indewd.2 Thus finely3 did he his false nets dispred, With which he many weake harts had subdewd Of yore, and many had ylike misled: What wonder then, if she were likewise carried?

10

No fort so fensible,4 no wals so strong, But that continuall battery will rive, Or daily siege through dispurvayaunce5 long, And lacke of reskewes will to parley6 drive; And Peece,7 that unto parley eare will give, Will shortly yield it selfe, and will be made The vassall of the victors will bylive:8 That stratageme had oftentimes assayd This crafty Paramoure, and now it plaine displayd.

11

For through his traines9 he her intrapped hath, That she her love and hart hath wholy sold To him, without regard of gaine, or scath,10 Or care of credite,11 or of husband old, Whom she hath vow’d to dub a fayre Cucquold.12 Nought wants but time13 and place, which shortly shee

1 I.e., he served her dutifully and did homage, but with the double entendre of doing her sexual service. (It is only a double entendre here, given that stanza 11 implies no assignation has yet taken place.) 2 indewd: digested. 3 finely: cunningly. 4 fensible: well-fortified; defensive. 5 dispurvayaunce: destitution; denial or lack of provisions.

6

parley: discuss terms (with the besiegers). Peece: fort. 8 bylive: speedily. 9 traines: entrapments. 10 scath: harm. 11 credite: reputation. 12 Cucquold: cuckold. 13 time: opportunity. 7

Canto Ten

191

Devized hath, and to her lover told. It pleased well. So well they both agree; So readie rype to ill, ill wemens counsels bee. 12

Darke was the Evening, fit for lovers stealth, When chaunst Malbecco busie be elsewhere, She to his closet1 went, where all his wealth Lay hid: thereof she countlesse summes did reare, The which she meant away with her to beare; The rest she fyr’d for sport, or for despight; As Hellene, when she saw aloft appeare The Trojane flames, and reach to hevens hight Did clap her hands, and joyed at that dolefull sight.

13

This second Helene, fayre Dame Hellenore, The whiles her husband ran with sory haste, To quench the flames, which she had tyn’d2 before, Laught at his foolish labour spent in waste; And ran into her lovers armes right fast; Where streight embraced, she to him did cry, And call alowd for helpe, ere helpe were past, For lo that Guest did beare her forcibly, And meant to ravish her, that rather had to dy.

14

The wretched man hearing her call for ayd, And ready seeing him with her to fly, In his disquiet mind was much dismayd: But when againe he backeward cast his eye, And saw the wicked fire so furiously Consume his hart,3 and scorch his Idoles face, He was therewith distressed diversely, Ne wist he how to turne, nor to what place. Was never wretched man in such a wofull cace.

15

Ay when to him she cryde, to her he turnd, And left the fire; love money overcame: But when he marked,4 how his money burnd,

1 2

closet: private room. tyn’d: kindled.

3

hart: heart—here a metaphor for his money, which is also his idol. 4

marked: noticed.

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He left his wife; money did love disclame: Both was he loth to loose1 his loved Dame, And loth to leave his liefest2 pelfe behinde, Yet sith he n’ote save both, he sav’d that same, Which was the dearest to his dounghill3 minde, The God of his desire, the joy of misers blinde. 16

Thus whilest all things in troublous uprore were, And all men busie to suppresse the flame, The loving couple neede no reskew feare, But leasure had, and liberty to frame4 Their purpost flight, free from all mens reclame;5 And Night, the patronesse of love-stealth fayre, Gave them safe conduct, till to end they came: So beene they gone yfere, a wanton payre Of lovers loosely knit, where list them to repayre.6

17

Soone as the cruell flames yslaked were, Malbecco seeing, how his losse did lye, Out of the flames, which he had quencht whylere Into huge waves of griefe and gealosye Full deepe emplonged was, and drowned nye, Twixt inward doole and felonous7 despight; He rav’d, he wept, he stampt, he lowd did cry, And all the passions, that in man may light, Did him attonce oppresse, and vex his caytive8 spright.

18

Long thus he chawd the cud of inward griefe, And did consume his gall with anguish sore, Still when he mused on his late mischiefe,9 So still the smart thereof increased more, And seemd more grievous, then it was before: At last when sorrow he saw booted nought,

1

loose: lose, with a pun on freeing her to lead a loose life.

6

2

I.e., they went together—that wanton pair of loosely (and lewdly) united lovers— wherever they wanted to go.

3

7

liefest: dearest. dounghill: dunghill. 4 frame: get on with (OED v2). 5 reclame: recall (calling back to a place); reclamation (calling back to the right conduct; laying claim to again).

doole: grief; felonous: cruel. caytive: vile. 9 mischiefe: misfortune. 8

Canto Ten

193

Ne griefe might not his love to him restore, He gan devise, how her he reskew mought, Ten thousand wayes he cast1 in his confused thought. 19

At last resolving, like a Pilgrim2 pore, To search her forth, where so she might be fond, And bearing with him treasure in close store, The rest he leaves in ground:3 So takes in hond To seeke her endlong,4 both by sea and lond. Long he her sought, he sought her far and nere, And every where that he mote understond, Of knights and ladies any meetings were, And of eachone he mett, he tidings did inquere.

20

But all in vaine, his woman was too wise, Ever to come into his clouch5 againe, And hee too simple6 ever to surprise The jolly7 Paridell, for all his paine. One day, as hee forpassed by8 the plaine With weary pace, he far away espide A couple, seeming well to be his twaine, Which hoved9 close under a forest side, As if they lay in wait, or els themselves did hide.

21

Well weened hee, that those the same mote bee, And as he better did their shape avize, Him seemed more their maner did agree; For th’one was armed all in warlike wize, Whom, to be Paridell he did devize;10

1

cast: considered. Pilgrim: traveler; one who makes a journey to a shrine or other holy place as an act of devotion. 3 There were no banks; nevertheless, by leaving most of his treasure in the ground, Malbecco proves himself like the third servant in the parable of the talents: entrusted with the safekeeping of one of his master’s coins, he proves himself unworthy of his master’s trust when he buries the coin in the ground rather than risk investing it (Matt. 25.14–30). 2

4

endlong: from end to end (of the country—or, hyperbolically, of the earth). 5 clouch: clutch; claw. 6 simple: foolish; not acute. 7 jolly: sprightly; overweeningly selfconfident; lustful. 8 forpassed by: passed over. 9 hoved: lingered; hovered. 10 devize: figure.

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And th’other al yclad in garments light, Discolourd1 like to womanish disguise, He did resemble2 to his lady bright, And ever his faint hart much earned3 at the sight. 22

And ever faine4 he towards them would goe, But yet durst not for dread approchen nie, But stood aloofe, unweeting what to doe, Till that prickt forth with loves extremity,5 That is the father of fowle gealosy, He closely nearer crept, the truth to weet: But, as he nigher drew, he easily Might scerne,6 that it was not his sweetest sweet, Ne yet her Belamour,7 the partner of his sheet.

23

But it was scornefull Braggadochio, That with his servant Trompart hoverd there, Sith late he fled from his too earnest foe: Whom such whenas Malbecco spyed clere, He turned backe, and would have fled arere;8 Till Trompart ronning hastely, him did stay, And bad before his soveraine Lord appere: That was him loth, yet durst he not gainesay, And comming him before, low louted on the lay.9

24

The Boaster at him sternely bent his browe, As if he could have kild him with his looke, That to the ground him meekely made to bowe, And awfull terror deepe into him strooke, That every member of his body quooke.10 Said he, “Thou man of nought, what doest thou here, Unfitly furnisht with thy bag and booke,11 Where I expected one with shield and spere, To prove some deeds of armes upon an equall pere.”

1

6

2

7

Discolourd: multicolored. resemble: liken. 3 earned: yearned; mourned. 4 faine: desirous. 5 Cf. Britomart’s ranckling wound after she has seen Artegall in the mirror (ii.35–39).

scerne: discern. Belamour: beautiful lover. 8 arere: to the rear. 9 louted: bowed; lay: lea, ground. 10 quooke: quaked. 11 Accoutrements of a pilgrim.

Canto Ten

25

The wretched man at his imperious speach, Was all abasht, and low prostrating, said; “Good Sir, let not my rudenes be no breach Unto your patience, ne be ill ypaid;1 For I unwares this way by fortune straid, A silly2 Pilgrim driven to distresse, That seeke a Lady,” There he suddein staid, And did the rest with grievous sighes suppresse, While teares stood in his eies, few drops of bitternesse.

26

“What Lady, man?” (said Trompart) “take good hart, And tell thy griefe, if any hidden lye; Was never better time to shew thy smart, Then now, that noble succor3 is thee by, That is the whole worlds commune remedy.” That chearful word his weak heart much did cheare, And with vaine hope his spirits faint supply, That bold he sayd, “O most redoubted Pere, Vouchsafe4 with mild regard a wretches cace to heare.”

27

Then sighing sore, “It is not long” (saide hee) “Sith I enjoyd the gentlest Dame alive; Of whom a knight, no knight at all perdee, But shame of all, that doe for honor strive, By treacherous deceipt did me deprive; Through open outrage he her bore away, And with fowle force unto his will did drive, Which al good knights, that armes do bear this day, Are bownd for to revenge, and punish if they may.

28

“And you most noble Lord, that can and dare Redresse the wrong of miserable wight, Cannot employ your most victorious speare In better quarell, then defence of right, And for a Lady gainst a faithlesse knight, So shall your glory bee advaunced much, And all faire Ladies magnify5 your might, And eke my selfe, albee I simple such, Your worthy paine shall wel reward with guerdon6 rich.”

1

4

2

5

ill ypaid: displeased. silly: lowly; defenseless; unsophisticated. 3 succor: aid.

Vouchsafe: grant. magnify: extol. 6 guerdon: reward.

195

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29

With that out of his bouget1 forth he drew Great store of treasure, therewith him to tempt; But he2 on it lookt scornefully askew, As much disdeigning to be so misdempt,3 Or a war-monger to be basely nempt;4 And sayd, “Thy offers base I greatly loth, And eke thy words uncourteous and unkempt;5 I tread in dust thee and thy money both, That, were it not for shame,”6 So turned from him wroth.

30

But Trompart, that his maistres humor knew, In lofty looks to hide an humble minde, Was inly tickled with that golden vew, And in his eare him rownded7 close behinde: Yet stoupt he not, but lay still in the winde, Waiting advauntage on the pray to sease;8 Till Trompart lowly to the grownd inclinde, Besought him his great corage9 to appease, And pardon simple man, that rash did him displease.

31

Big looking like a doughty Doucepere,10 At last he thus, “Thou clod of vilest clay, I pardon yield, and that with rudenes beare; But weete henceforth, that all that golden pray,11 And all that els the vaine world vaunten may, I loath as doung, ne deeme my dew reward: Fame is my meed, and glory vertuous pray. But minds of mortal men are muchell12 mard, And mov’d amisse with massy mucks unmeet regard.

1

bouget: pouch. he: Braggadocchio. 3 misdempt: misdeemed, misjudged. 4 nempt: named, called. 5 unkempt: rude. 6 He leaves the rest of the sentence unsaid, implying that he would do worse to the pilgrim if it were not shameful for a knight to attack one of lower degree. 2

7 him rownded: whispered to him (Braggadocchio). 8 I.e., like a hawk waiting to kill, he didn’t swoop but lay in the wind, waiting for the best time to seize his prey. 9 corage: wrath. 10 doughty Doucepere: valiant knight, one of the twelve peers of France. 11 pray: booty. 12 muchell: much.

Canto Ten

32

“And more, I graunt to thy great misery Gratious respect,1 thy wife shall backe be sent, And that vile knight, who ever that he bee, Which hath thy lady reft, and knighthood shent,2 By Sanglamort my sword, whose deadly dent3 The blood hath of so many thousands shedd, I sweare, ere long shall dearly it repent; Ne he twixt heven and earth shall hide his hedd, But soone he shalbe fownd, and shortly doen be dedd.”

33

The foolish man thereat woxe wondrous blith,4 As if the word so spoken, were halfe donne, And humbly thanked him a thousand sith,5 That had from death to life him newly wonne. Tho forth the Boaster marching, brave begonne His stolen steed6 to thunder furiously, As if he heaven and hell would overonne, And all the world confound7 with cruelty, That much Malbecco joyed in his jollity.8

34

Thus long they three together traveiled, Through many a wood, and many an uncouth way, To seeke his wife, that was far wandered: But those two sought nought, but the present pray, To weete the treasure, which he did bewray, On which their eies and harts were wholly sett, With purpose, how they might it best betray;9 For sith the howre, that first he did them lett The same behold, therwith their keene desires were whett.

35

It fortuned as they together far’d, They spide, where Paridell came pricking fast Upon the plaine, the which him selfe prepar’d To giust with that brave straunger knight a cast,10

1

respect: regard. shent: disgraced. 3 Sanglamort: Bloody Death, the name of his sword; dent: dint, blow. 4 blith: blithe. 5 sith: times. 2

197

6 stolen steed: see II.iii.4, where Braggadocchio finds and steals Guyon’s horse. 7 confound: utterly defeat. 8 jollity: high-hearted confidence. 9 betray: deliver it out of his hands. 10 giust: joust; cast: bout.

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As on adventure by the way he past: Alone he rode without his Paragone;1 For having filcht her bells,2 her up he cast To the wide world, and let her fly alone, He nould3 be clogd. So had he served many one. 36

The gentle Lady, loose at randon lefte,4 The greene-wood long did walke, and wander wide At wilde adventure, like a forlorne wefte,5 Till on a day the Satyres her espide Straying alone withouten groome or guide; Her up they tooke, and with them home her ledd, With them as housewife ever to abide, To milk their gotes, and make them cheese and bredd, And every one as commune good6 her handeled.

37

That shortly she Malbecco has forgott, And eke Sir Paridell, all were he deare; Who from her went to seeke another lott, And now by fortune was arrived here, Where those two guilers with Malbecco were: Soone as the oldman saw Sir Paridell, He fainted, and was almost dead with feare, Ne word he had to speake, his griefe to tell, But to him louted7 low, and greeted goodly well.

38

And after asked him for Hellenore, “I take no keepe of her” (sayd Paridell) “She wonneth in the forrest there before.”8

1

Paragone: consort. filcht her bells: i.e., had sex with her, having thus taken her reputation from her. Filching bells is a metaphor from the sport of hawking, in which a falconer attached bells to a hawk’s legs so he could keep track of where the hawk was. Paridell has taken what he wanted from Hellenore and has released her. 3 nould: would not. 2

4

at randon lefte: left at liberty. This is a hawking phrase to describe prey that does not rise for the hawk’s attack.

5

At wilde adventure: at hazard in the wilderness; wefte: waif—an abandoned piece of property that may legally be claimed by the finder. 6 good: property. 7 louted: bowed. 8 before: before us; in front of us.

Canto Ten

199

So forth he rode, as his adventure fell;1 The whiles the Boaster from his loftie sell2 Faynd to alight, something amisse to mend; But the fresh Swayne would not his leasure dwell, But went his way; whom when he passed kend,3 He up remounted light, and after faind to wend. 39

“Perdy nay” (said Malbecco) “shall ye not: But let him passe as lightly,4 as he came: For litle good of him is to be got, And mickle perill to bee put to shame. But let us goe to seeke my dearest Dame, Whom he hath left in yonder forest wyld: For of her safety in great doubt I ame, Least salvage beastes her person have despoyld: Then all the world is lost, and we in vaine have toyld.”

40

They all agree, and forward them addrest: “Ah but” (said crafty Trompart) “weete ye well, That yonder in that wastefull wildernesse Huge monsters haunt, and many dangers dwell; Dragons, and Minotaures, and feendes of hell, And many wilde woodmen,5 which robbe and rend All traveilers; therefore advise ye well, Before ye enterprise that way to wend: One may his journey bring too soone to evill end.”

41

Malbecco stopt in great astonishment,6 And with pale eyes fast fixed on the rest, Their counsell crav’d, in daunger imminent. Said Trompart, “You that are the most opprest7 With burdein of great treasure, I thinke best Here for to stay in safetie behynd; My Lord and I will search the wide forest.” That counsell pleased not Malbeccoes mynd; For he was much afraid, him selfe alone to fynd.

1 as his adventure fell: to whatever events chance might bring him. 2 sell: saddle. 3 I.e., when he knew him to have passed; when he passed out of sight.

4

lightly: easily; quickly; without conscience. 5 woodmen: savages; crazy men. 6 astonishment: stupor of indecision and dismay. 7 opprest: weighed down.

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42

“Then is it best” (said he)1 “that ye doe leave Your treasure here in some security, Either fast closed in some hollow greave,2 Or buried in the ground from jeopardy, Till we returne againe in safety: As for us two, least doubt of us ye have, Hence farre away we will blyndfolded ly, Ne privy3 bee unto your treasures grave.” It pleased: so he did. Then they march forward brave.4

43

Now when amid the thickest woodes they were, They heard a noyse of many bagpipes5 shrill, And shrieking Hububs them approching nere, Which all the forest did with horrour fill: That dreadfull sound the bosters hart did thrill,6 With such amazment, that in hast he fledd, Ne ever looked back for good or ill, And after him eke fearefull Trompart spedd; The old man could not fly, but fell to ground half dedd.

44

Yet afterwardes close creeping, as he might, He in a bush did hyde his fearefull hedd, The jolly Satyres full of fresh delight, Came dauncing forth, and with them nimbly ledd Faire Helenore, with girlonds all bespredd, Whom their May-lady they had newly made: She proude of that new honour, which they redd, And of their lovely7 fellowship full glade, Daunst lively, and her face did with a Lawrell8 shade.

45

The silly man that in the thickett lay Saw all this goodly sport, and grieved sore, Yet durst he not against it doe or say, But did his hart with bitter thoughts engore, To see th’unkindnes9 of his Hellenore.

1

he: Trompart. greave: thicket. 3 privy: in on the secret. 4 brave: bravely; with a splendid show. 5 bagpipes: symbolic of lust, because their shape resembles that of the scrotum and penis. 2

6

thrill: stab. lovely: loving. 8 Lawrell: laurel wreath, associated with poetry as well as with the satyrs’ god, Pan. 9 unkindnes: unnatural behavior inappropriate for a woman and for a human. 7

Canto Ten

201

All day they daunced with great lusty hedd, And with their horned feet the greene gras wore, The whiles their Gotes upon the brouzes1 fedd, Till drouping Phœbus gan to hyde his golden hedd. 46

Tho up they gan their mery pypes to trusse, And all their goodly heardes did gather rownd, But every Satyre first did give a busse2 To Hellenore: so busses did abound. Now gan the humid vapour shed3 the grownd With perly deaw, and th’Earthes gloomy shade Did dim the brightnesse of the welkin4 rownd, That every bird and beast awarned made, To shrowd themselves, whiles sleepe their sences did invade.

47

Which when Malbecco saw, out of his bush Upon his hands and feete he crept full light, And like a Gote emongst the Gotes did rush, That through the helpe of his faire hornes5 on hight, And misty dampe of misconceyving6 night, And eke through likenesse of his gotish beard, He did the better counterfeite aright: So home he marcht emongst the horned heard, That none of all the Satyres him espyde or heard.

48

At night, when all they went to sleepe, he vewd, Whereas his lovely wife emongst them lay, Embraced of a Satyre rough and rude, Who all the night did minde7 his joyous play: Nine times he heard him come aloft8 ere day, That all his hart with gealosy did swell;

1

Gotes: Spenser seems to be imagining either that the satyrs––in addition to being half man, half goat––also keep goats, or else that they look like men but ride goats; brouzes: young shoots. 2 busse: kiss. 3 shed: sprinkle. 4 welkin: sky.

5 hornes: a cuckold was described metaphorically as having horns on his head, like a goat’s horns. 6 misconceyving: liable to cause misconceptions. 7 minde: pay attention to. 8 come aloft: i.e., mount Hellenore; achieve orgasm.

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But yet that nights ensample did bewray, That not for nought his wife them loved so well, When one so oft a night did ring his matins bell.1 49

So closely as he could, he to them crept, When wearie of their sport to sleepe they fell, And to his wife, that now full soundly slept, He whispered in her eare, and did her tell, That it was he, which by her side did dwell, And therefore prayd her wake, to heare him plaine. As one out of a dreame not waked well, She turnd her, and returned backe againe: Yet her for to awake he did the more constraine.2

50

At last with irkesom trouble she abrayd;3 And then perceiving, that it was indeed Her old Malbecco, which did her upbrayd, With loosenesse of her love, and loathly deed, She was astonisht with exceeding dreed, And would have wakt the Satyre by her syde; But he her prayd, for mercy, or for meed, To save his life, ne let him be descryde, But hearken to his lore,4 and all his counsell hyde.

51

Tho gan he her perswade, to leave that lewd And loathsom life, of God and man abhord, And home returne, where all should be renewd With perfect peace, and bandes5 of fresh accord, And she receivd againe to bed and bord,6 As if no trespas ever had beene donne: But she it all refused at one word, And by no meanes would to his will be wonne, But chose emongst the jolly Satyres still to wonne.

1

ring his matins bell: slang for “achieve orgasm” (literally, “ring the bell to call himself to midnight prayers”). Malbecco realizes that Hellenore has a reason to prefer the satyrs to him: they can have nine orgasms in one night.

2

constraine: exert himself; urge her. abrayd: awoke. 4 lore: sage advice. 5 bandes: unifying bonds. 6 bord: table. 3

Canto Ten

52

He wooed her, till day spring he espyde; But all in vaine: and then turnd to the heard, Who butted him with hornes on every syde, And trode downe in the durt, where his hore beard Was fowly dight,1 and he of death afeard. Early before the heavens fairest light Out of the ruddy East was fully reard, The heardes out of their foldes2 were loosed quight, And he emongst the rest crept forth in sory plight.

53

So soone as he the Prison dore3 did pas, He ran as fast, as both his feet could beare, And never looked, who behind him was, Ne scarsely who before:4 like as a Beare That creeping close, amongst the hives to reare An hony combe, the wakefull dogs espy, And him assayling, sore his carkas teare, That hardly he with life away does fly, Ne stayes, till safe him selfe he see from jeopardy.

54

Ne stayd he, till he came unto the place, Where late his treasure he entombed had, Where when he found it not (for Trompart bace Had it purloyned for his maister bad:)5 With extreme fury he became quite mad,6 And ran away, ran with him selfe away:7 That who so straungely had him seene bestadd,8 With upstart haire, and staring eyes dismay, From Limbo lake him late escaped sure would say.9

55

High over hilles and over dales he fledd, As if the wind him on his winges had borne, Ne banck nor bush could stay10 him, when he spedd

1

dight: dirtied. foldes: pens (for the Satyrs’ goats). 3 Prison dore: referring perhaps to the gate of the goat pen, but more importantly, referring to the fact that the site of the Satyrs’ and Hellenore’s revels now seems a prison to him. 4 before: in front. 5 No, this is not an emoticon. 2

6

203

mad: insane. The repetition emphasizes the two ways in which he is running away. 8 I.e., whoever had seen him so strangely assailed. 9 I.e., would surely think he had just escaped from the portion of hell where lost souls reside. 10 stay: stop; impede. 7

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His nimble feet, as treading still on thorne: Griefe, and despight, and gealosy, and scorne Did all the way him follow hard behynd, And he himselfe himselfe loath’d so forlorne, So shamefully forlorne of womankynd; That1 as a Snake, still lurked in his wounded mynd. 56

Still fled he forward, looking backward still, Ne stayd his flight, nor fearefull agony, Till that he came unto a rocky hill, Over the sea, suspended dreadfully, That living creature it would terrify, To looke adowne, or upward to the hight: From thence he threw him selfe dispiteously,2 All desperate3 of his fore-damned spright, That seemd no help for him was left in living sight.

57

But through long anguish, and selfe-murdring thought He was so wasted and forpined4 quight, That all his substance was consum’d to nought, And nothing left, but like an aery Spright, That on the rockes he fell so flit and light, That he thereby receiv’d no hurt at all, But chaunced on a craggy cliff to light; Whence he with crooked clawes5 so long did crall, That at the last he found a cave with entrance small.

58

Into the same he creepes, and thenceforth there Resolv’d to build his balefull mansion, In drery darkenes, and continuall feare Of that rocks fall, which ever and anon Threates with huge ruine him to fall upon, That he dare never sleepe, but that one eye

1

That: i.e., that he was “forlorne of womankynd.” 2 dispiteously: without mercy toward himself. 3 desperate: despair is the most deadly of the seven deadly sins, because in order to despair of all hope, one must have separated

oneself utterly from God. Malbecco is desperate and therefore damned, yet his desperation makes him not care about being damned. 4 forpined: utterly wasted away. 5 clawes: he is turning into a beast.

Canto Ten

205

Still ope he keepes for that occasion; Ne ever rests he in tranquillity, The roring billowes beat his bowre so boystrously.1 59

Ne ever is he wont on ought to feed, But todes and frogs, his pasture2 poysonous, Which in his cold complexion3 doe breed A filthy blood, or humour rancorous, Matter of doubt and dread suspitious, That doth with curelesse care consume the hart, Corrupts the stomacke with gall vitious,4 Croscuts the liver with internall smart, And doth transfixe the soule with deathes eternall dart.

60

Yet can he never dye, but dying lives, And doth himselfe with sorrow new sustaine, That death and life attonce unto him gives. And painefull pleasure turnes to pleasing paine. There dwels he ever, miserable swaine, Hatefull both to him selfe, and every wight; Where he through privy griefe, and horrour vaine, Is woxen so deform’d that he has quight Forgot he was a man, and Gelosy is hight.5

1

Malbecco’s physical surroundings are a visual metaphor for his emotional state. 2 pasture: food. 3 cold complexion: character caused by an excess of cold humor.

4

vitious: vicious; foul; harmful. Malbecco has turned into a reductive emblem of himself.

5

Canto Eleven Britomart chaceth Ollyphant,1 findes Scudamour2 distrest: Assayes3 the house of Busyrane, where loves spoyles are exprest.4

1

O Hatefull hellish Snake, what furie furst Brought thee from balefull house of Proserpine,5 Where in her bosome she thee long had nurst, And fostred up with bitter milke of tine,6 Fowle Gealosy, that turnest love divine To joylesse dread, and mak’st the loving hart With hatefull thoughts to languish and to pine, And feed it selfe with selfe-consuming smart? Of all the passions in the mind thou vilest art.

2

O let him far be banished away, And in his stead let Love for ever dwell, Sweete Love, that doth his golden wings embay7 In blessed Nectar,8 and pure Pleasures well, Untroubled of vile feare, or bitter fell.9 And ye faire Ladies, that your kingdomes make In th’harts of men, them governe wisely well, And of faire Britomart ensample take, That was as trew in love, as Turtle to her make.10

3

Who with Sir Satyrane, as earst ye red,11 Forth ryding from Malbeccoes hostlesse12 hous, Far off aspyde a young man, the which fled

1

6

2

7

Ollyphant: see vii.48.2.n. Scudamour: see vi.53.2.n. 3 Assayes: assails; puts to the test; examines; tries out; attempts. All of these meanings will become quite important. 4 exprest: portrayed. 5 Proserpine: the queen of hell.

tine: affliction. embay: steep. 8 Nectar: the favorite drink of the gods. 9 fell: animosity, resentment. 10 Turtle: turtledove; make: mate. 11 as earst ye red: at x.1. 12 hostlesse: inhospitable.

206

Canto Eleven

207

From an huge Geaunt, that with hideous And hatefull outrage long him chaced thus; It was that Ollyphant, the brother deare Of that Argante vile and vitious, From whom the Squyre of Dames was reft1 whylere; This all as bad as she, and worse, if worse ought were. 4

For as the sister did in feminine And filthy lust exceede all woman kinde, So he surpassed his sex masculine, In beastly use all, that I ever finde: Whom when as Britomart beheld behinde The fearefull boy so greedily2 poursew, She was emmoved in her noble minde, T’employ her puissaunce to his reskew, And pricked fiercely forward, where she did him vew.

5

Ne was Sir Satyrane her far behinde, But with like fiercenesse did ensew3 the chace: Whom when the Gyaunt saw, he soone resinde4 His former suit,5 and from them fled apace; They after both, and boldly bad him bace,6 And each did strive the other to outgoe; But he them both outran a wondrous space, For he was long, and swift as any Roe, And now made better speed, t’escape his feared foe.

6

It was not Satyrane, whom he did feare, But Britomart the flowre of chastity; For he the powre of chaste hands might not beare, But alwayes did their dread encounter fly: And now so fast his feet he did apply, That he has gotten to a forrest neare, Where he is shrowded in security. The wood they enter, and search everie where, They searched diversely,7 so both divided were.

1

reft: taken away. See vii.37–52. greedily: avidly. 3 ensew: pursue. 4 resinde: resigned. 5 suit: pursuit. 2

6 bad him bace: challenged him, turning the pursuer into the pursued (in the words of a children’s game called “prisoner’s base”). 7 diversely: in different directions (a tactic as necessary for Spenser’s narrative as for the plots of old westerns).

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7

Fayre Britomart so long him followed, That she at last came to a fountaine sheare,1 By which there lay a knight all wallowed2 Upon the grassy ground, and by him neare His haberjeon, his helmet, and his speare; A little off 3 his shield was rudely throwne, On which the winged boy in colours cleare Depeincted4 was, full easie to be knowne, And he thereby, where ever it in field was showne.5

8

His face upon the grownd did groveling ly, As if he had beene slombring in the shade, That the brave Mayd would not for courtesy, Out of his quiet slomber him abrade, Nor seeme too suddeinly him to invade:6 Still as she stood, she heard with grievous throb Him grone, as if his hart were peeces made, And with most painefull pangs to sigh and sob, That pitty did the Virgins hart of patience rob.

9

At last forth breaking into bitter plaintes7 He sayd, “O soverayne Lord that sit’st on hye, And raignst in blis emongst thy blessed Saintes, How suffrest8 thou such shamefull cruelty, So long unwreaked9 of thine enimy? Or hast thou, Lord, of good mens cause no heed? Or doth thy justice sleepe, and silent ly? What booteth then the good and righteous deed, If goodnesse find no grace, nor righteousnes no meed?

10

“If good find grace, and righteousnes reward, Why then is Amoret in caytive10 band, Sith that more bounteous creature never far’d

1

fountaine sheare: clear spring. wallowed: dirtied by having rolled about on the ground. 3 off: away (from him). 4 Depeincted: painted. 5 I.e., whenever the knight showed the shield on a field of battle, it was easy to identify both the picture of Cupid and the 2

knight who carried the shield (since Cupid is his heraldic sign). 6 invade: intrude upon. 7 plaintes: complaints. 8 suffrest: allow. 9 unwreaked: unavenged. 10 caytive: captive.

Canto Eleven

209

On foot, upon the face of living land? Or if that hevenly justice may withstand The wrongfull outrage of unrighteous men, Why then is Busirane1 with wicked hand Suffred, these seven monethes day2 in secret den My Lady and my love so cruelly to pen? 11

“My Lady and my love is cruelly pend In dolefull darkenes from the vew of day, Whilest deadly torments doe her chast brest rend, And the sharpe steele doth rive her hart in tway,3 All for she Scudamore will not denay.4 Yet thou vile man, vile Scudamore art sound,5 Ne canst her ayde, ne canst her foe dismay; Unworthy wretch to tread upon the ground, For whom so faire a Lady feeles so sore a wound.”6

12

There an huge heape of singulfes7 did oppresse His strugling soule, and swelling throbs empeach8 His foltring toung with pangs of drerinesse, Choking the remnant of his plaintife9 speach, As if his dayes were come to their last reach. Which when she heard, and saw the ghastly fit, Threatning into his life to make a breach, Both with great ruth10 and terrour she was smit, Fearing least from her cage11 the wearie soule would flit.

13

Tho stouping downe she him amoved12 light; Who therewith somewhat starting, up gan looke, And seeing him behind a stranger knight,

1 Busirane: Busiris was a mythical king of Egypt, Poseidon’s son, who killed all visitors to his land. 2 seven monethes day: seven months. 3 rive: rend asunder; in tway: in two. 4 denay: deny, forswear; refuse to give him anything. 5 thou vile man: Scudamour berates himself; sound: whole, unwounded. 6 Busirane’s wounding Amoret represents more than the harms wreaked by a third party; Scudamour feels responsible because

he cannot rescue her, but he also feels responsible because in some sense he himself has caused the wound. 7 singulfes: sobs (a Spenserian neologism). 8 empeach: hinder; accuse of treason. 9 plaintife: plaintive; characteristic of one who pleads his own case. 10 ruth: compassion. 11 her: the soul’s; cage: i.e., the mortal body. 12 amoved: stirred.

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Whereas no living creature he mistooke,1 With great indignaunce he that sight forsooke, And downe againe himselfe disdainefully Abjecting,2 th’earth with his faire forhead strooke: Which the bold Virgin seeing, gan apply Fit medcine to his griefe, and spake thus courtesly. 14

“Ah gentle knight, whose deepe conceived griefe Well seemes t’exceede the powre of patience, Yet if that hevenly grace some good reliefe You send, submit you to high providence, And ever in your noble hart prepense,3 That all the sorrow in the world is lesse, Then vertues might, and values confidence, For who nill bide4 the burden of distresse, Must not here thinke to live: for life is wretchednesse.

15

“Therefore, faire Sir, doe comfort to you take, And freely read, what wicked felon so Hath outrag’d you, and thrald your gentle make.5 Perhaps this hand may helpe to ease your woe, And wreake your sorrow on your cruell foe, At least it faire endevour will apply.” Those feeling words so neare the quicke6 did goe, That up his head he reared easily,7 And leaning on his elbowe, these few words lett fly.

16

“What boots it plaine,8 that cannot be redrest, And sow vaine sorrow in a fruitlesse eare, Sith powre of hand, nor skill of learned brest, Ne worldly price cannot redeeme my deare, Out of her thraldome and continuall feare?9 For he the tyrant, which her hath in ward10

1

I.e., he mistakes the stranger knight for an apparition. 2 Abjecting: throwing; making abject. 3 prepense: consider. 4

nill: will not; bide: endure. make: mate. 6 neare the quicke: near the center of his emotional sensitivity (literally, near the sensitive flesh). 5

7

easily: quickly. plaine: to complain. 9 her thraldome and continuall feare: Hamilton points out that this line suggests that Amoret’s continual fear is, in fact, her imprisonment—i.e., that her misgivings about her and Scudamour’s relationship are what hold her thrall (Hamilton, FQ III.xi.16.3–5.n.). 10 in ward: under guard. 8

Canto Eleven

211

By strong enchauntments and blacke Magicke leare,1 Hath in a dungeon deepe her close embard,2 And many dreadfull feends hath pointed3 to her gard. 17

“There he tormenteth her most terribly, And day and night afflicts with mortall paine, Because to yield him love she doth deny, Once to me yold,4 not to be yolde againe: But yet by torture he would her constraine Love to conceive in her disdainfull brest; Till so she doe, she must in doole5 remaine, Ne may by living meanes6 be thence relest: What boots it then to plaine, that cannot be redrest?”

18

With this sad hersall7 of his heavy stresse, The warlike Damzell was empassiond sore, And sayd, “Sir knight, your cause is nothing lesse, Then is your sorrow, certes if not more; For nothing so much pitty doth implore,8 As gentle Ladyes helplesse misery. But yet, if please ye listen to my lore,9 I will with proofe of last extremity,10 Deliver her fro thence, or with her for you dy.”

19

“Ah gentlest knight alive,” (sayd Scudamore) “What huge heroicke magnanimity11 Dwells in thy bounteous brest? what couldst thou more, If shee were thine, and thou as now am I? O spare thy happy daies, and them apply To better boot,12 but let me die, that ought; More is more losse: one is enough to dy.” “Life is not lost,” (said she) “for which is bought Endlesse renowm, that more then death is to be sought.”

1

8

2

9

leare: lore, learning. embard: barred in. 3 pointed: appointed. 4 yold: yielded. 5 doole: distress (mental or physical). 6 by living meanes: by any living person; by anything except death. 7 hersall: rehearsal, recounting.

implore: beg. lore: wise advice. 10 with proofe of last extremity: risking my life. 11 magnanimity: lofty courage; loftiness of purpose. 12 boot: advantage.

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20

Thus shee at length persuaded him to rise, And with her wend, to see what new successe Mote him befall upon new enterprise; His armes, which he had vowed to disprofesse,1 She gathered up, and did about him dresse, And his forwandred2 steed unto him gott: So forth they both yfere make their progresse,3 And march not past the mountenaunce of a shott,4 Till they arriv’d, whereas their purpose they did plott.

21

There they dismounting, drew their weapons bold And stoutly5 came unto the Castle gate; Whereas no gate they found, them to withhold, Nor ward6 to wait at morne and evening late, But in the Porch, that did them sore amate,7 A flaming fire, ymixt with smouldry smoke, And stinking Sulphure, that with griesly8 hate And dreadfull horror did all entraunce choke, Enforced them their forward footing to revoke.9

22

Greatly thereat was Britomart dismayd, Ne in that stownd10 wist, how her selfe to beare; For daunger vaine it were, to have assayd11 That cruell element,12 which all things feare, Ne none can suffer to approchen neare: And turning backe to Scudamour, thus sayd; “What monstrous enmity provoke13 we heare, Foolhardy, as the Earthes children,14 which made Batteill against the Gods? so we a God15 invade.

1

disprofesse: renounce. forwandred: strayed. 3 progresse: journey. 4 mountenaunce of a shott: distance of a bow shot.

10

5

13

2

stoutly: bravely. 6 ward: guard. 7 amate: overwhelm; dismay; confound. 8 griesly: grisly, causing horror. 9 revoke: retrace, withdraw.

stownd: time of trial; state of stupefaction. 11 assayd: tested; attempted. 12 cruell element: i.e., fire, one of the four elements. provoke: challenge; defy; arouse to anger. 14 Earthes children: the Giants, who revolted unsuccessfully against Zeus. 15 a God: either Mulciber, the god of fire (see 26.5), or Cupid, the cruel god of love.

Canto Eleven

23

“Daunger without discretion to attempt, Inglorious and beastlike is: therefore Sir knight, Aread what course of you is safest dempt,1 And how we with our foe may come to fight.” “This is” (quoth he) “the dolorous despight, Which earst to you I playnd:2 for neither may This fire be quencht by any witt or might, Ne yet by any meanes remov’d away; So mighty be th’enchauntments, which the same do stay.3

24

“What is there ells, but cease these fruitlesse paines, And leave me to my former languishing? Faire Amorett must dwell in wicked chaines, And Scudamore here die with sorrowing.” “Perdy not so;” (said shee) “for shameful thing Yt were t’abandon noble chevisaunce,4 For shewe of perill, without venturing: Rather let try extremities of chaunce, Then enterprised praise for dread to disavaunce.”5

25

Therewith resolv’d to prove her utmost might, Her ample shield she threw before her face, And her swords point directing forward right,6 Assayld the flame, the which eftesoones gave place, And did it selfe divide with equall space,7 That through she passed, as a thonder bolt Perceth the yielding ayre, and doth displace The soring clouds into sad showres ymolt;8 So to her yold the flames, and did their force revolt.9

1

dempt: deemed. playnd: complained. 3 stay: support. 4 chevisaunce: chivalrous enterprise to effect a remedy; chivalrous enterprise to win booty. 5 I.e., than let dread make us retreat from a praiseworthy enterprise. (Seeking praise through the glory of enterprise was noble.) 6 The imagery is both Christian and phallic. Britomart has “put on the whole armor of 2

213

God” and has taken “the shield of faith, with which [she] can quench all the flaming darts of the evil one” (Eph. 6.11,16). At the same time, with her sword pointing forward, she is sexually penetrating the flames of desire. 7 I.e., in halves. 8 sad: severe; ymolt: melted. 9 yold: yielded; revolt: turn back.

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26

Whome whenas Scudamour saw past the fire, Safe and untoucht, he likewise gan assay, With greedy will, and envious desire, And bad the stubborne flames to yield him way: But cruell Mulciber1 would not obay His threatfull pride, but did the more augment His mighty rage, and with imperious sway Him forst (maulgre)2 his fercenes to relent, And backe retire, all scorcht and pitifully brent.3

27

With huge impatience he inly swelt,4 More for great sorrow, that he could not pas, Then for the burning torment, which he felt, That with fell woodnes he effierced5 was, And wilfully him throwing on the gras, Did beat and bounse his head and brest ful sore; The whiles the Championesse now entred has The utmost rowme, and past the formest6 dore, The utmost rowme, abounding with all precious store.7

28

For round about, the walls yclothed were With goodly arras8 of great majesty, Woven with gold and silke so close and nere,9 That the rich metall10 lurked privily, As faining to be hidd from envious eye; Yet here, and there, and every where unwares11 It shewd it selfe, and shone unwillingly; Like to a discolourd12 Snake, whose hidden snares Through the greene gras his long bright burnisht back declares.13

1

Mulciber: Vulcan, the god of fire. maulgre: in spite of himself; in spite of his ferocity. 3 brent: burned. It is worth considering why Scudamour cannot enter when Britomart can. 4 swelt: sweltered; burned; perished with strong emotion. 5 woodnes: madness; fury; effierced: made fierce; maddened. 2

6

utmost: outermost; formest: foremost. store: cache of goods; treasure. 8 arras: tapestries. 9 nere: tightly (i.e., tightly woven). 10 I.e., gold threads. 11 unwares: unexpectedly, catching the viewer unawares. 12 discolourd: multicolored. 13 declares: reveals; represents. 7

Canto Eleven

29

And in those Tapets1 weren fashioned Many faire pourtraicts,2 and many a faire feate, And all of love, and al of lusty-hed, As seemed by their semblaunt did entreat;3 And eke all Cupids warres they did repeate,4 And cruell battailes, which he whilome fought Gainst all the Gods, to make his empire great; Besides the huge massacres, which he wrought On mighty kings and kesars, into thraldome brought.5

30

Therein was writt,6 how often thondring Jove Had felt the point of his hart percing dart, And leaving heavens kingdome, here did rove In straunge disguize, to slake his scalding smart;7 Now like a Ram, faire Helle to pervart,8 Now like a Bull, Europa to withdraw:9 Ah, how the fearefull Ladies tender hart Did lively seeme to tremble, when she saw The huge seas under her t’obay her servaunts law.10

31

Soone after that into a golden showre11 Him selfe he chaung’d, faire Danaë to vew, And through the roofe of her strong brasen towre Did raine into her lap an hony dew,12

1

Tapets: tapestries. pourtraicts: portraits; pictures. 3 semblaunt: portrayal; deceitful appearance; entreat: treat; entice the viewer. 4 repeate: recount. 5 Cupid’s power has mushroomed far beyond shooting a few arrows that ranckle in a few hearts. 6 writt: depicted. 7 Jove often took on the disguise of an animal or of something else found on earth, in order to rape, or have affairs with, mortal women. Many of the following stories are taken from Ovid’s Metamorphoses; some are from other sources, including Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso, Natalis Comes’ commentary, and tapestries that Spenser could have seen. 8 pervart: turn away; pervert morally. 2

9

215

In the guise of a bull, Jove put Europa onto his back and carried her off (Metamorphoses, 2.836–75, 6.103–7). 10 The description of the tapestry has begun to seem like a description of moving persons and things. This technique is common in many epics’ extended descriptions of art objects—known as ekphrasis. In the Iliad, for example, the description of Achilles’ shield asks us to see far more detail than could actually be depicted on one shield, along with phenomena that cannot be pictured on any surface: movement, sounds, the passage of time, tactile sensations, and so on (Iliad, 18.478–617). 11 I.e., a shower of gold pieces. 12 hony dew: a deliciously sweet liquid mythically supposed to fall like dew.

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The whiles her foolish garde, that litle knew Of such deceipt, kept th’yron dore fast bard, And watcht, that none should enter nor issew; Vaine was the watch, and bootlesse all the ward, Whenas the God to golden hew1 him selfe transfard. 32

Then was he turnd into a snowy Swan, To win faire Leda to his lovely trade:2 O wondrous skill, and sweet wit of the man,3 That her in daffadillies sleeping made, From scorching heat her daintie limbes to shade: Whiles the proud Bird ruffing4 his fethers wyde, And brushing his faire brest, did her invade; Shee slept, yet twixt her eielids closely spyde, How towards her he rusht, and smiled at his pryde.5

33

Then shewd it, how the Thebane Semelee Deceivd of gealous Juno, did require To see him in his soverayne majestee, Armd with his thunderbolts and lightning fire, Whens dearely she with death bought her desire.6 But faire Alcmena better match did make, Joying his love in likenes more entire; Three nights in one, they say, that for her sake He then did put, her pleasures lenger to partake.7

1

hew: form. lovely trade: amorous dealings. 3 the man: the artist who designed the tapestry. 4 ruffing: ruffling. 5 pryde: self-satisfaction; erotic desire. Ovid often depicts the objects of Zeus’ rapes as being terrified. Here, the author of Busirane’s tapestry pictures Leda as a tease, pretending to sleep while actually welcoming Jove’s invasion of her body. Spenser is inviting us to compare this tapestry with the tapestries of Venus and Adonis’ story in Malecasta’s castle (i.34–38) and to compare the intentions of the owners of the two sets of tapestries, as well as the intentions and 2

characters of the viewers. See also xii.4.2.n. 6 Jealous of Semele, who was her husband’s latest paramour, Juno tricked Semele into asking Jove to come to her in his full glory rather than disguised in mortal shape. Reluctantly—but bound by a previous oath— Jove did so, and the encounter with his lightning majesty killed Semele on the spot (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 3.259–315). Compare Jove’s reluctance with Scudamour’s sense of guilt. 7 Jove disguised himself as Alcmena’s husband in order to have sex with her. In order to prolong the encounter, he made the night three times as long as a normal night (Natalis Comes, Mythologiae, 6.1).

Canto Eleven

34

Twise was he seene in soaring Eagles shape, And with wide winges to beat the buxome1 ayre, Once, when he with Asterie2 did scape, Againe, when as the Trojane boy3 so fayre He snatcht from Ida hill, and with him bare: Wondrous delight it was, there to behould, How the rude Shepheards after him did stare, Trembling through feare, least down he fallen should And often to him calling, to take surer hould.

35

In Satyres shape Antiopa he snatcht: And like a fire, when he Aegin’ assayd: A shepeheard, when Mnemosyne he catcht:4 And like a Serpent to the Thracian mayd.5 Whyles thus on earth great Jove these pageaunts playd, The winged boy did thrust into his throne, And scoffing, thus unto his mother sayd, “Lo now the hevens obey to me alone, And take me for their Jove, whiles Jove to earth is gone.”

36

And thou, faire Phœbus,6 in thy colours bright Wast there enwoven, and the sad distresse, In which that boy thee plonged, for despight, That thou bewray’dst his mothers wantonnesse, When she with Mars was meynt in joyfulnesse:7 For thy he thrild thee with a leaden dart, To love faire Daphne, which thee loved lesse: Lesse she thee lov’d, then was thy just desart, Yet was thy love her death, and her death was thy smart.8

1

buxome: yielding. In order to escape from Jove’s attack, Asterie changed into a quail, but then Jove changed himself into an eagle. 3 Trojane boy: Ganymede, who became the cup-bearer to the gods after Jove abducted him (Metamorphoses, 10.155–61). 4 For this and the following lines, see Metamorphoses, 6.110–14. 5 the Thracian mayd: Proserpina (Greek “Persephone”). 6 Phœbus: Apollo, the sun god. 2

217

7 meynt: mingled in sexual intercourse. When Apollo told Venus’ husband, Vulcan, that she was being unfaithful to him, Venus got revenge by using her power to make Apollo fall painfully in love with Leucothoë, after which one of Apollo’s discarded women killed Leucothoë (Metamorphoses, 4.190–255). Apollo later fell in love with Daphne, who fled from him and was changed into a laurel tree by a compassionate god; Spenser combines the two episodes. 8 smart: pain.

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37

So lovedst thou the lusty Hyacinct,1 So lovedst thou the faire Coronis 2 deare: Yet both are of thy haplesse hand extinct, Yet both in flowres doe live; and love thee beare, The one a Paunce,3 the other a sweet breare: For griefe whereof, ye mote have lively seene The God himselfe rending his golden heare, And breaking quite his garlond ever greene, With other signes of sorrow and impatient teene.4

38

Both for those two, and for his owne deare sonne, The sonne of Climene5 he did repent, Who bold to guide the charet of the Sunne, Himselfe in thousand peeces fondly rent,6 And all the world with flashing fire brent: So like, that all the walles did seeme to flame. Yet cruell Cupid, not herewith content, Forst him7 eftsoones to follow other game, And love a Shephards daughter for his dearest Dame.

39

He loved Isse for his dearest Dame, And for her sake her cattell fedd a while, And for her sake a cowheard vile became, The servant of Admetus cowheard vile, Whiles that from heaven he suffered exile.8 Long were to tell each other lovely fitt,9 Now like a Lyon, hunting after spoile, Now like a Stag,10 now like a faulcon flit: All which in that faire arras was most lively writ.

1

lusty: lively; beautiful; full of sexual appetite; Hyacinct: see vi.45.3.n. 2 Coronis: see Metamorphoses, 2.542–632. 3 Paunce: pansy, which is purple, like the hyacinth. 4 teene: affliction; sorrow. 5 sonne of Climene: Phaethon asked to drive his father’s sun chariot for one day. With misgivings, Phoebus allowed it, but Phaethon lost control of the horses and repeatedly bumped into the earth, causing conflagrations everywhere and ultimately killing himself (Metamorphoses, 2.19–400). 6 fondly rent: foolishly ripped.

7

him: Phoebus Apollo. Apollo disguised himself as a shepherd in order to approach Isse; at another time, Jove threw him out of heaven. Spenser combines the two stories. 9 fitt: passion; section of a story told in verse. 10 Stag: although all early editions have “Hag,” there is no record of Jove’s disguising himself as an old woman, whereas in the same passage upon which Spenser is relying for this list, Natalis Comes describes Jove as taking on the disguise of a stag (Smith, textual note, citing Jortin). 8

Canto Eleven

40

Next unto him was Neptune pictured, In his divine resemblance wondrous lyke: His face was rugged, and his hoarie hed Dropped with brackish deaw; his threeforkt Pyke He stearnly shooke, and therewith fierce did stryke The raging billowes, that on every syde They trembling stood, and made a long broad dyke, That his swift charet might have passage wyde, Which foure great Hippodames did draw in temewise1 tyde.

41

His seahorses did seeme to snort amayne,2 And from their nosethrilles3 blow the brynie streame, That made the sparckling waves to smoke agayne, And flame with gold, but the white fomy creame, Did shine with silver, and shoot forth his beame. The God himselfe did pensive seeme and sad, And hong adowne his head, as4 he did dreame: For privy love his brest empierced had, Ne ought but deare Bisaltis5 ay could make him glad.

42

He loved eke Iphimedia6 deare, And Aeolus7 faire daughter Arne hight. For whom he turnd him selfe into a Steare, And fedd on fodder, to beguile her sight. Also to win Deucalions daughter8 bright, He turnd him selfe into a Dolphin fayre; And like a winged horse he tooke his flight, To snaky-locke Medusa9 to repayre, On whom he got10 faire Pegasus, that flitteth in the ayre.

1 Hippodames: hippopotami or seahorses; in temewise: as a team. 2 amayne: with all their might (with a pun on “on the main,” on the sea). 3 nosethrilles: nostrils. 4 as: as if. 5 According to Hyginus, it was Bisaltis’ daughter, Theophane, to whom Neptune came in the form of a ram (Fabulae, 188). 6 Iphimedia: to whom Neptune came in the disguise of a river. 7 Aeolus: the god of the winds. 8 Deucalions daughter: Melantho.

219

9 Medusa: the most famous of the Gorgons (see ix.22.8.n.). Medusa was a beautiful woman who served Minerva as a vestal virgin. After Neptune raped Medusa in Minerva’s temple, Minerva punished the victim by changing Medusa’s hair into snakes and giving her the power to turn into stone any men who looked at her. Perseus finally figured out how to cut off Medusa’s head without having to look at her, whereupon Minerva put either the head or a representation of it upon her breastplate, to frighten off her enemies. 10 got: begot.

220

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

43

Next Saturne was, (but who would ever weene, That sullein Saturne ever weend to love?1 Yet love is sullein, and Saturnlike seene, As he did for Erigone2 it prove,) That to a Centaure did him selfe transmove.3 So proov’d it eke that gratious God of wine,4 When for to compasse Philliras hard love, He turnd himselfe into a fruitfull vine, And into her faire bosome made his grapes decline.

44

Long were to tell the amorous assayes,5 And gentle pangues, with which he6 maked meeke The mightie Mars,7 to learne his wanton playes: How oft for Venus, and how often eek For many other Nymphes he8 sore did shreek, With womanish teares, and with unwarlike smarts, Privily moystening his horrid9 cheeke. There was he painted full of burning dartes, And many wide woundes launched10 through his inner partes.

45

Ne did he spare (so cruell was the Elfe11) His owne deare mother, (ah why should he so?) Ne did he spare sometime to pricke himselfe, That he might taste the sweet consuming woe,12 Which he had wrought to many others moe. But to declare the mournfull Tragedyes,

1

Saturn was believed the farthest planet, with an inimical astrological influence. As a god, he was sullen and bellicose. 2 Erigone: in Ovid, but either Spenser or his printer seems to have confused her with Philliras, mentioned in line 7. 3

Centaure: half man, half horse, and known for lust; transmove: transform. 4 God of wine: Bacchus. 5 assayes: assaults; experiments. 6 pangues: pangs; he: Love personified; Cupid (see 29.5, the word “love” repeated three times in stanza 43, and all of stanza 45).

7

Mars: god of war. he: Mars, whose pains are uncharacteristically “unwarlike”(6). 9 horrid: bristly. 10 launched: lanced. 8

11

the Elfe: Cupid. The image of Cupid’s giving himself a wound in order to feel the sweet pain of love will intensify and darken in the following canto, when we meet Amoret and her torturer.

12

Canto Eleven

221

And spoiles, wherewith he all the ground did strow, More eath to number, with how many eyes1 High heven beholdes sad lovers nightly theeveryes.2 46

Kings Queenes, Lords Ladies, Knights and Damsels gent Were heap’d together with the vulgar sort, And mingled with the raskall rablement, Without respect of person or of port,3 To shew Dan4 Cupids powre and great effort: And round about a border was entrayld,5 Of broken bowes and arrowes shivered6 short, And a long bloody river through them rayld,7 So lively and so like, that living sence it fayld.8

47

And at the upper end of that faire rowme, There was an Altar built of pretious stone, Of passing valew, and of great renowme,9 On which there stood an Image all alone, Of massy10 gold, which with his owne light shone; And winges it had with sondry colours dight, More sondry colours, then the proud Pavone11 Beares in his boasted fan, or Iris 12 bright, When her discolourd13 bow she spreds through heven bright.

48

Blyndfold he14 was, and in his cruell fist A mortall bow and arrowes keene did hold, With which he shot at randon, when him list, Some headed with sad15 lead, some with pure gold; (Ah man beware, how thou those dartes behold) A wounded Dragon under him did ly,

1

eath: easy; eyes: i.e., stars. theeveryes: thieveries—i.e., stealing hearts. 3 I.e., without distinguishing among types of persons or among social positions. 4 Dan: courtesy title for a male member of a religious order or for a male scholar, knight, poet, or deity. 5 I.e., around the tapestry was twined a border. 6 shivered: splintered. 7 rayld: flowed. 2

8

like: lifelike; fayld: made to fail (i.e., it tricked the eye). 9 renowme: renown. 10 massy: weighty; solid. 11 Pavone: peacock (Italian). 12 Iris: the rainbow. 13 discolourd: multicolored. 14 he: the gold statue of Cupid, who is conventionally depicted as blindfolded because he does not care whom he shoots; love is random. 15 sad: heavy; causing sorrow.

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Whose hideous tayle his lefte foot did enfold, And with a shaft was shot through either eye, That no man forth might draw, ne no man remedye.1 49

And underneath his feet was written thus, “Unto the Victor of the Gods this bee:” And all the people in that ample hous Did to that image bowe their humble knee, And oft committed fowle Idolatree, That wondrous sight faire Britomart amazd, Ne seeing could her wonder satisfie, But evermore and more upon it gazd, The whiles the passing brightnes her fraile sences dazd.

50

Tho as she backward2 cast her busie eye, To search each secrete of that goodly sted,3 Over the dore thus written she did spye “Bee bold:” she oft and oft it over-red Yet could not find what sence it figured: But what so were therein, or writ or ment, She was no whit thereby discouraged, From prosecuting of her first intent, But forward with bold steps into the next roome went.

51

Much fayrer, then the former, was that roome, And richlier by many partes arayd: For not with arras made in painefull loome,4 But with pure gold it all was overlayd, Wrought with wilde Antickes,5 which their follies playd, In the rich metall, as they living were: A thousand monstrous formes therein were made, Such as false love doth oft upon him weare, For love in thousand monstrous formes doth oft appeare.

1

In a well-known emblem book, the emblem “Custodienda virgines” (“Virgins Must Be Protected”) depicts a woman with a dragon by her side (Alciati, 22). Here in the House of Busirane, then, Cupid has defeated the dragon that guards chastity.

2

backward: behind the statue of Cupid. sted: place. 4 I.e., made painstakingly on a loom. 5 Antickes: grotesque figures. 3

Canto Eleven

223

52

And all about, the glistring walles were hong With warlike spoiles, and with victorious prayes,1 Of mighty Conquerours and Captaines strong, Which were whilome captived in their dayes, To cruell love, and wrought their owne decayes:2 Their swerds and speres were broke, and hauberques3 rent And their proud girlonds of tryumphant bayes, Troden in dust with fury insolent, To shew the victors might and mercilesse intent.

53

The warlike Mayd beholding earnestly The goodly ordinaunce4 of this rich Place, Did greatly wonder, ne could satisfy Her greedy eyes with gazing a long space,5 But more she mervaild that no footings trace, Nor wight appear’d, but wastefull emptinesse,6 And solemne silence over all that place: Straunge thing it seem’d, that none was to possesse So rich purveyaunce,7 ne them keepe with carefulnesse.

54

And as she lookt about, she did behold, How over that same dore8 was likewise writ, “Be bolde, be bolde,” and every where “Be bold,” That much she muz’d, yet could not construe it9 By any ridling skill, or commune wit.10 At last she spyde at that rowmes upper end, Another yron dore, on which was writ, “Be not too bold;” whereto though she did bend Her earnest minde, yet wist not what it might intend.11

1

9

2

10

prayes: booty. decayes: downfalls (from pining away or committing suicide in despair). 3 hauberques: tunics of chain mail. 4 ordinaunce: weapons, ammunition, and other martial equipment. 5 space: time. 6 In contrast to the first room, which held bowing people. 7 purveyaunce: furnishings. 8 I.e., the inside of the door through which she has now come.

construe it: figure it out. commune wit: common sense. 11 intend: mean. The phrases come from the well-known folk tale of Mr. Fox (in later versions called Bluebeard), who forbade his fiancée, Lady Mary, to enter a certain room of his castle. Over the doors was written, “Be bold, be bold, but not too bold, lest that your heart’s blood should run cold.” When she opened the door, she saw the bones and blood of Mr. Fox’s previous wives. If Busirane can persuade Britomart to feel horror at the idea that she could

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Thus she there wayted untill eventyde, Yet living creature none she saw appeare: And now sad shadowes gan the world to hyde From mortall vew, and wrap in darkenes dreare; Yet nould she d’off 1 her weary armes, for feare Of secret daunger, ne let sleepe oppresse Her heavy eyes with natures burdein deare, But drew her selfe aside in sickernesse,2 And her welpointed wepons did about her dresse.3

become a prisoner of love like Amoret, perhaps he will keep her from trying to rescue Amoret. 1 nould: would not; d’off: doff, remove.

2

sickernesse: security. welpointed: well appointed; well pointed (sharp); dresse: arrange; prepare. 3

Canto Twelve The maske1 of Cupid, and th’enchanted Chamber are displayd, Whence Britomart redeemes faire Amoret, through charmes decayd.2

1

Tho when as chearelesse Night ycovered had Fayre heaven with an universall clowd, That every wight dismayd with darkenes sad, In silence and in sleepe themselves did shrowd, She heard a shrilling Trompet sound alowd, Signe of nigh battaill, or got victory;3 Nought therewith daunted was her courage prowd, But rather stird to cruell enmity, Expecting ever,4 when some foe she might descry.

1

maske: a masque was a form of entertainment popular at court and at the houses of the very wealthy, where only invited guests attended. Performed only once, a masque was an emblematic presentation of actors—sometimes drawn from the noble families themselves—dressed to represent virtues, vices, and other abstract concepts. Costumes and sets were usually elaborate, with special effects, e.g., thunder and lightning. Whereas many masques involved songs, dancing, and poetry, the Masque of Cupid in the House of Busirane belongs to a subgenre of the masque, in which the actors passed by in a silent procession. Some masques ended with the audience joining the actors in a dance that symbolized, among other things, the audience’s participation in the concepts represented in the masque. Although the Masque of Cupid does not end this way, it is useful to remember the customary symbolism of such dances when we consider Britomart’s relationship to the scene that she views. It is also useful to note that masques were often presented at weddings of the aristocracy

and that a wedding masque often might include a mock abduction of the bride. Although Spenser waited six years after first publishing the cantos about the Masque of Cupid to develop the idea that the way Amoret got into Busirane’s house in the first place was that he abducted her on her wedding day (IV.i.3), and although we need to consider what the Masque of Cupid means to readers before they encounter the account of the abduction in Book Four, we also need to see what happens when we read that later part of the story back into the final canto of Book Three. 2 I.e., Amoret has wasted away through the power of charms. As in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it is important to consider the magic not simply as an external force, but as a representation of what may happen to ordinary people who experience love without being affected by literal magic. 3 got victory: victory that has been achieved. 4 Expecting ever: always on the lookout for.

225

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2

With that, an hideous storme of winde arose, With dreadfull thunder and lightning atwixt,1 And an earthquake, as if it streight would lose The worlds foundations from his centre fixt; A direfull stench of smoke and sulphure mixt Ensewd, whose noyaunce fild the fearefull sted,2 From the fourth howre of night untill the sixt;3 Yet the bold Britonesse was nought ydred, Though much emmov’d, but stedfast still persevered.

3

All suddeinly a stormy whirlwind blew Throughout the house, that clapped4 every dore, With which that yron wicket5 open flew, As it with mighty levers had bene tore:6 And forth yssewd, as on the readie7 flore Of some Theatre, a grave personage, That in his hand a braunch of laurell bore, With comely haveour8 and count’nance sage, Yclad in costly garments, fit for tragicke Stage.

4

Proceeding to the midst, he stil did stand, As if in minde he somewhat9 had to say, And to the vulgare10 beckning with his hand, In signe of silence, as to heare a play,

1 atwixt: i.e., between the claps of thunder. 2 noyaunce: noxiousness; annoyance; fearefull: causing fear; sted: place. 3 I.e., from ten o’clock until midnight. 4 clapped: slammed. 5 wicket: the iron door mentioned at xi.54.7. 6 Whereas one might compare the special effects of an ordinary masque to magic, here Busirane’s magic is being compared to the special-effects machinery of an ordinary masque. 7 readie: prepared for performance. 8 haveour: bearing. 9 somewhat: something. 10 vulgare: lowest of the commoners in the audience; groundlings standing to watch the

performance. Here, only Britomart is watching, from her hiding place (27.4–5), so the “grave personage” is beckoning to an imaginary or invisible audience. The question of who constitutes the allegorical audience for the entire performance is both crucial and complicated, as is the question of who constitutes its author. Allegorically, possible audiences include Britomart, Scudamour, Amoret, Busirane, Queen Elizabeth, and us. Possible authors include Spenser, Busirane, Amoret, Scudamour, and Britomart (the latter three as unwitting authors of their own anxieties)—as well as Elizabeth, whom Spenser will eventually name as the source of the entire poem (VI.Arg.7). An interpretation of the Masque of Cupid can incorporate most of the possible combinations of these authors and audiences; they are not mutually exclusive.

Canto Twelve

227

By lively actions he gan bewray1 Some argument of matter passioned;2 Which doen, he backe retyred soft away, And passing by, his name discovered, Ease, on his robe in golden letters cyphered.3 5

The noble Mayd, still standing all this vewd, And merveild at his straunge intendiment;4 With that a joyous fellowship5 issewd Of Minstrales,6 making goodly meriment, With wanton Bardes, and Rymers impudent, All which together song full chearefully A lay of loves delight, with sweet concent:7 After whom marcht a jolly company, In manner of a maske, enranged8 orderly.

6

The whiles a most delitious harmony, In full straunge notes was sweetly heard to sound, That the rare sweetnesse of the melody The feeble sences wholy did confound, And the frayle soule in deepe delight nigh drownd: And when it ceast, shrill trompets lowd did bray, That their report9 did far away rebound, And when they ceast, it10 gan againe to play, The whiles the maskers marched forth in trim11 aray.

1

bewray: reveal. argument: plot; passioned: passionate. 3 cyphered: written in letters. 4 intendiment: intent. 5 fellowship: company. 6 Minstrales: minstrels. They sang, told stories, and performed silly tricks for their patrons, especially at feasts, weddings, and other celebrations. 2

7 concent: harmony; giving in to love or to sexual overtures. 8 enranged: arranged. 9 report: explosive noise. 10 it: the music described in lines 1 through 5, which causes a pleasantly drugged state of mind. 11 trim: finely and neatly arranged, spruced up.

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7

The first was Fansy,1 like a lovely Boy, Of rare aspect, and beautie without peare,2 Matchable ether to that ympe3 of Troy, Whom Jove did love, and chose his cup to beare, Or that same daintie lad,4 which was so deare To great Alcides, that when as he5 dyde, He6 wailed womanlike with many a teare, And every wood, and every valley wyde He fild with Hylas name; the Nymphes eke “Hylas” cryde.

8

His garment nether was of silke nor say,7 But paynted plumes, in goodly order dight, Like as the sunburnt Indians do aray Their tawney bodies, in their proudest plight: As those same plumes, so seemd he vaine and light, That by his gate8 might easily appeare; For still he far’d9 as dauncing in delight, And in his hand a windy fan did beare, That in the ydle ayre he mov’d still here and theare.

1

Fansy: desire; capricious desire; imagination. The three meanings are bound up with each other. Early modern poets were fascinated with the ability of the lover to create imaginary and therefore misleading versions of the beloved inside the mind. Petrarchan poets ironized their own tendency to prefer their imaginary versions of their mistresses to the actual women whom they loved (see, e.g., Sidney’s “This night while sleepe begins with heavy wings,” Astrophil and Stella). Britomart is trying to understand what it means to be a woman who is at least partly in the position of a traditionally male Petrarchan lover, pursuing an image of her beloved; and both Britomart and Amoret are trying to figure out what it means for a woman to give herself in marriage. Figures in the pageant represent the most delusional and tormenting aspects of Petrarchan love. Busirane wants his viewers to learn from the pageant that they should fear love—or wants Amoret in particular to

learn to fear loving Scudamour in particular—yet Busirane’s pageant is also produced by the fears that already torment Amoret, Britomart, and Scudamour. Some of the same fears surface, albeit more subtly, in Spenser’s Epithalamion, which celebrates his second marriage and which registers an uneasiness that the groom might hurt the bride physically or psychologically on their wedding night (not an unreasonable anxiety, especially given that women often died in childbirth). 2 peare: peer. 3 ether: either; ympe: offspring, here referring to Ganymede. See xi.34.4 and n. 4 I.e., Hylas. 5 he: Hylas. 6 He: Alcides. 7 say: a finely woven cloth. 8 gate: gait. 9 still he far’d: always he behaved.

Canto Twelve

9

And him beside marcht amorous Desyre, Who seemd of ryper yeares, then th’other Swayne, Yet was that other swayne this elders syre,1 And gave him being, commune to them twayne: His garment was disguysed very vayne, And his embrodered Bonet2 sat awry; Twixt both his hands few sparks he close did strayne,3 Which still he blew, and kindled busily, That soone they life conceiv’d, and forth in flames did fly.

10

Next after him went Doubt, who was yclad In a discolour’d cote, of straunge disguyse, That at his backe a brode Capuccio4 had, And sleeves dependaunt Albanese-wyse:5 He lookt askew with his mistrustfull eyes, And nycely trode, as6 thornes lay in his way Or that the flore to shrinke he did avyse And on a broken reed he still did stay,7 His feeble steps, which shrunck, when hard thereon he lay.8

11

With him went Daunger, cloth’d in ragged weed,9 Made of Beares skin, that him more dreadfull made, Yet his owne face was dreadfull, ne did need Straunge horrour, to deforme his griesly shade;10 A net in th’one hand, and a rusty blade In th’other was, this Mischiefe,11 that mishap; With th’one his foes he threatned to invade, With th’other he his friends ment to enwrap: For whom he could not kill, he practizd12 to entrap.

1

Showing allegorically that fancy produces desire. 2 Bonet: soft cap for men. 3 close did strayne: closely clasped. 4 Capuccio: a hood or cowl, emblematic of fraud. 5 Albanese-wyse: in the Scottish (or Celtic) manner. 6 nycely: carefully; daintily; as: as if. 7 stay: prop up, as with a crutch. 8 shrunck: bent or collapsed; lay: leaned.

229

9 Daunger: primarily danger in the modern sense, as indicated by the rest of his portrait, but also the medieval concept of daunger: the coyness, hesitation, or ungraciousness exhibited by one who wished to discourage—or appear to discourge—another’s advances; weed: clothing. 10 Straunge: added from outside himself; shade: image. 11 Mischiefe: in the sixteenth century, used more often in a serious sense than to describe adorable infractions. 12 practizd: schemed.

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12

Next him was Feare, all arm’d from top to toe, Yet thought himselfe not safe enough thereby, But feard each shadow moving to or froe,1 And his owne armes when glittering he did spy, Or clashing heard, he fast away did fly, As ashes pale of hew, and winged heeld;2 And evermore on daunger fixt his eye, Gainst whom he alwayes bent a brasen shield, Which his right hand unarmed fearefully did wield.

13

With him went Hope in rancke,3 a handsome Mayd Of chearefull looke and lovely to behold; In silken samite4 she was light arayd, And her fayre lockes were woven5 up in gold; She alway smyld, and in her hand did hold An holy water Sprinckle, dipt in deowe,6 With which she sprinckled favours manifold, On whom she list, and did great liking sheowe, Great liking unto many, but true love to feowe.

14

And after them Dissemblaunce,7 and Suspect Marcht in one rancke, yet an unequall paire: For she was gentle, and of milde aspect, Courteous to all, and seeming debonaire,8 Goodly adorned, and exceeding faire: Yet was that all but paynted, and pourloynd,9 And her bright browes were deckt with borrowed haire:10 Her deeds were forged, and her words false coynd, And alwaies in her hand two clewes11 of silke she twynd.

1

to or froe: toward or away from him. I.e., Fear’s appearance is as pale as ashes, and his heels have wings. 3 in rancke: by his side; everyone proceeds in pairs. 4 samite: a heavy, expensive silk fabric, often interwoven with gold and silver threads. 5 woven: braided or twined. 6 Sprinckle: an aspergillum, the brush that is used to sprinkle holy water during the 2

Catholic mass; deowe: dew, as if the water came from heaven. 7 Dissemblaunce: dissimulation. 8 debonaire: courteous, affable. 9 pourloynd: purloined, stolen. 10 In emblem books, sermons, and moral tracts, women’s makeup, wigs, and deceptive clothing were often held up as evidence of hypocrisy and of using physical beauty to conceal moral corruption. 11 clewes: balls of thread.

Canto Twelve

15

But he was fowle, ill favoured, and grim, Under his eiebrowes looking still askaunce;1 And ever as Dissemblaunce laught on him, He lowrd2 on her with daungerous eyeglaunce; Shewing his nature in his countenaunce; His rolling eies did never rest in place, But walkte each where,3 for feare of hid mischaunce, Holding a lattis4 still before his face, Through which he stil did peep, as forward he did pace.

16

Next5 him went Griefe, and Fury matcht yfere; Griefe all in sable sorrowfully clad, Downe hanging his dull head, with heavy chere, Yet inly being more, then seeming sad: A paire of Pincers in his hand he had, With which he pinched people to the hart, That from thenceforth a wretched life they ladd, In wilfull languor6 and consuming smart, Dying each day with inward wounds of dolours dart.

17

But Fury was full ill7 appareiled, In rags, that naked nigh she did appeare, With ghastly looks and dreadfull drerihed;8 For from her backe her garments she did teare, And from her head ofte rent her snarled heare: In her right hand a firebrand shee did tosse9 About her head, still roming here and there; As a dismayed Deare in chace embost,10 Forgetfull of his safety, hath his right way lost.

18

After them went Displeasure and Pleasaunce, He looking lompish11 and full sullein sad, And hanging downe his heavy countenaunce;

1

askaunce: out of the corner of his eye, mistrustfully. 2 lowrd: scowled. 3 each where: everywhere. 4 lattis: lattice, which is also called a “jalousie,” a word just then coming into the English language from the Italian gelosia. A jealous person might spy through a jalousie.

5

231

Next: following. languor: languishing. 7 ill: badly. 8 drerihed: dreariness. 9 tosse: brandish. 10 embost: driven to extremity; driven into the woods; foaming at the mouth. 11 lompish: lumpish, dejected. 6

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She chearfull fresh and full of joyaunce glad, As if no sorrow she ne felt ne dread; That evill1 matched paire they seemd to bee: An angry Waspe th’one in a viall had, Th’other in hers an hony-lady Bee; Thus marched these six couples forth in faire degree. 19

After all these there marcht a most faire Dame, Led of two grysie villeins,2 th’one Despight, The other cleped Cruelty by name: She dolefull Lady, like a dreary Spright, Cald by strong charmes out of eternall night, Had Deathes owne ymage figurd in her face, Full of sad signes, fearfull to living sight, Yet in that horror shewd a seemely grace, And with her feeble feete did move a comely3 pace.

20

Her brest all naked, as nett4 yvory, Without adorne5 of gold or silver bright, Wherewith the Craftesman6 wonts it beautify, Of her dew honour was despoyled quight, And a wide wound therein (O ruefull sight) Entrenched deep with knyfe accursed7 keene, Yet freshly bleeding forth her fainting spright, (The worke of cruell hand) was to be seene, That dyde in sanguine red her skin all snowy cleene.

21

At that wide orifice her trembling hart Was drawne forth, and in silver basin layd, Quite through transfixed8 with a deadly dart, And in her blood yet steeming fresh embayd:9 And those two villeins, which her steps upstayd, When her weake feete could scarcely her sustaine,

1

evill: badly. grysie: grisly; gray; villeins: serfs; baseminded wretches. 3 comely: decent; seemly. 4 nett: pure. 5 adorne: adornment. 2

6

Craftesman: crafter of jewelry. Entrenched: cut deeply (a Spenserian neologism); accursed: by means of magic spells. 8 transfixed: pierced. 9 embayd: steeped. 7

Canto Twelve

233

And fading vitall powres gan to fade, Her forward still with torture did constraine, And evermore encreased her consuming paine.1 22

Next after her, the winged God him selfe2 Came riding on a Lion ravenous, Taught to obay the menage3 of that Elfe, That man and beast with powre imperious Subdeweth to his kingdome tyrannous: His blindfold eies he bad a while unbinde, That his proud spoile of that same dolorous Faire Dame he might behold in perfect kinde,4 Which seene, he much rejoyced in his cruell minde.

23

Of which ful prowd, him selfe up rearing hye, He looked round about with sterne disdayne; And did survay his goodly company: And marshalling the evill ordered trayne, With that the darts which his right hand did straine,5 Full dreadfully he shooke that all did quake, And clapt on hye his coulourd winges twaine, That all his many6 it affraide did make: Tho blinding him againe, his way he forth did take.

24

Behinde him was Reproch, Repentaunce, Shame; Reproch the first, Shame next, Repent behinde: Repentaunce feeble, sorowfull, and lame: Reproch despightful, carelesse, and unkinde; Shame most ill favourd, bestiall, and blinde: Shame lowrd, Repentaunce sigh’d, Reproch did scould; Reproch sharpe stings, Repentaunce whips entwinde, Shame burning brond-yrons7 in her hand did hold: All three to each unlike, yet all made in one mould.8

1 Like Malbecco, Amoret has become a visual emblem of her own state of mind. 2 I.e., Cupid. 3 menage: manège, the handling and training of horses. 4 kinde: manner, sort. 5 With that: whereupon; straine: grip. 6 many: company.

7 brond-yrons: a neologism, perhaps meaning “branding irons,” but perhaps, as at VI.viii.10.4, meaning “sword.” 8 The constantly reordered repetition of the three figures’ names enacts the bewildering and unrelenting manner in which reproach (and self-reproach), repentance, and shame can assault someone who is in love.

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25

And after them a rude confused rout1 Of persons flockt, whose names is hard to read: Emongst them was sterne Strife, and Anger stout, Unquiet Care, and fond Unthriftyhead, Lewd Losse of Time, and Sorrow seeming dead, Inconstant Chaunge, and false Disloyalty, Consuming Riotise,2 and guilty Dread Of heavenly vengeaunce, faint Infirmity, Vile Poverty, and lastly Death with infamy.

26

There were full many moe like maladies, Whose names and natures I note readen well; So many moe, as there be phantasies In wavering wemens witt, that none can tell,3 Or paines in love, or punishments in hell; All which disguized marcht in masking4 wise, About the chamber by the Damozell,5 And then returned, having marched thrise, Into the inner rowme, from whence they first did rise.6

27

So soone as they were in, the dore streight way Fast locked, driven with that stormy blast, Which first it opened; nothing did remayne. Then the brave Maid,7 which al this while was plast, In secret shade, and saw both first and last, Issewed forth, and went unto the dore, To enter in, but fownd it locked fast: It vaine she thought with rigorous uprore8 For to efforce, when charmes had closed it afore.

28

Where force might not availe, there sleights and art She cast to use, both fitt for hard emprize;9 For thy from that same rowme not to depart Till morrow next, shee did her selfe avize,

1

The experience of love has degenerated into utter confusion. 2 Riotise: riotousness. 3 I.e., too many for anyone to count. Cf. the description of Alma’s wavering wit at II.ix.50–52 and of Britomart’s constant mind at III.i.19. See Introduction, 5d. 4 masking: masquing, of a masque.

5

the Damozell: either Amoret or Britomart—and the ambiguity is significant. 6 rise: issue. 7 the brave Maid: Britomart. 8 rigorous uprore: vehement turbulence; boisterous shaking. 9 emprize: enterprise, undertaking.

Canto Twelve

235

When that same Maske againe should forth arize. The morrowe next appeard with joyous cheare, Calling men to their daily exercize, Then she, as morrow fresh, her selfe did reare Out of her secret stand,1 that day for to outweare. 29

All that day she outwore in wandering, And gazing on that Chambers ornament, Till that againe the second evening Her covered with her sable vestiment, Wherewith the worlds faire beautie she hath blent:2 Then when the second watch3 was almost past, That brasen4 dore flew open, and in went Bold Britomart, as she had late forecast, Nether of ydle showes, nor of false charmes aghast.

30

So soone as she was entred, rownd about Shee cast her eies, to see what was become Of all those persons, which she saw without: But lo, they streight were vanisht all and some,5 Ne living wight she saw in all that roome, Save that same woefull Lady, both whose hands Were bounden fast, that did her ill become, And her small waste girt rownd with yron bands, Unto a brasen pillour,6 by the which she stands.

31

And her before the vile Enchaunter7 sate, Figuring straunge characters of his art,8 With living blood he those characters wrate,

1

stand: hiding place; post. blent: obscured—i.e., she has covered her beauty (the world’s best) with a black cloak, or she has shut out the beauty of the world (specifically, the room) with a black cloak. 3 second watch: the period between nine o’clock and midnight. 4 brasen: as strong as brass, though made of iron (xi.54.7, xii.3.3—and the pageant exited the same way it entered, according to xii.26.9). 5 all and some: one and all. 2

6

Amoret is bound to the phallus that she fears—taking “phallus” to mean both the erect penis and, in the more symbolic sense, the sum total of masculine power, including the power to define the world through words. 7 the vile Enchaunter: Busirane. 8 Cf. Merlin, who is also an “Enchaunter” and whom Britomart sees “writing straunge characters in the grownd” (iii.17.1, 14.8). Busirane is not to be equated with either Merlin or Spenser, but clearly Spenser uses him to comment upon the relationship between authorship, authority, enchantment, and coercion.

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Dreadfully dropping from her1 dying hart, Seeming transfixed with a cruell dart, And all perforce to make her him to love. Ah who can love the worker of her smart?2 A thousand charmes he formerly did prove; Yet thousand charmes could not her stedfast hart remove. 32

Soone as that virgin knight he saw in place,3 His wicked bookes4 in hast he overthrew, Not caring his long labours to deface, And fiercely running to that Lady5 trew, A murdrous knife out of his pocket drew, The which he thought, for villeinous despight, In her tormented bodie to embrew:6 But the stout Damzell to him leaping light, His cursed hand withheld, and maistered his might.

33

From her, to whom his fury first he ment,7 The wicked weapon rashly8 he did wrest, And turning to the next9 his fell intent, Unwares it strooke into her snowie chest, That litle drops empurpled her faire brest. Exceeding wroth therewith the virgin grew, Albe the wound were nothing deepe imprest,10 And fiercely forth her mortall blade she drew, To give him the reward for such vile outrage dew.

34

So mightily she smote him, that to ground He fell halfe dead; next stroke him should have slaine, Had not the Lady, which by him stood bound,

1

her: Amoret’s. The answer, of course, is, “Everyone.” In using an intentionally cruel and unscrupulous magician to stand in for the unintentionally cruel and conscience-stricken Scudamour, Spenser is examining the blurred line that separates ordinary love from sadomasochism. 3 in place: in the vicinity. 4 wicked bookes: books of spells. 5 that Lady: Amoret. 2

6 embrew: imbrue, stain with blood; plunge. 7 I.e., from Amoret, to whom he first directed his fury. 8 rashly: hastily. 9 the next: Britomart. 10 nothing deepe imprest: not at all deeply imprinted. Busirane has not succeeded in writing deeply into Britomart’s heart.

Canto Twelve

237

Dernly1 unto her called to abstaine, From doing him to dy. For else her paine Should be remedilesse, sith none but hee, Which wrought it, could the same recure2 againe. Therewith she stayd her hand, loth stayd to bee; For life she him envyde, and long’d revenge to see. 35

And to him said, “Thou wicked man, whose meed For so huge mischiefe, and vile villany Is death, or if that ought doe death exceed, Be sure, that nought may save thee from to dy, But if that thou this Dame doe presently Restore unto her health,3 and former state; This doe and live, els dye undoubtedly.” He glad of life, that lookt for4 death but late, Did yield him selfe right willing to prolong his date.5

36

And rising up, gan streight to overlooke6 Those cursed leaves, his charmes back to reverse;7 Full dreadfull thinges out of that balefull booke He red, and measur’d many a sad8 verse, That horrour gan the virgins hart to perse, And her faire locks up stared9 stiffe on end, Hearing him those same bloody lynes reherse;10 And all the while he red, she did extend Her sword high over him, if ought he did offend.11

37

Anon she gan perceive the house to quake, And all the dores to rattle round about; Yet all that did not her dismaied make,

1

Dernly: dismally; secretly; earnestly. recure: heal. 3 Imagine a dash before “whose”(1) and after “exceed”(3): “You wicked man—who deserve death or worse, if there is anything worse—be sure that nothing will save you from death unless you restore this woman to her health.” 4 lookt for: expected. 5 date: term of life. 6 overlooke: look over. 2

7

reverse: thus unwinding a charm that has been wound up, to use the terminology employed by Macbeth’s witches (Macbeth, 1.3.35). 8 measur’d: read, presumably with grave emphasis upon the meter; sad: solemn. 9 up stared: stood up. 10 reherse: go over. 11 if ought he did offend: in case he said anything wrong; whenever he did anything wrong.

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Nor slack her threatfull hand for daungers dout, But still with stedfast eye and courage stout, Abode to weet, what end1 would come of all. At last that mightie chaine, which round about Her tender waste was wound, adowne gan fall, And that great brasen pillour broke in peeces small. 38

The cruell steele, which thrild her dying hart, Fell softly forth, as of his owne accord, And the wyde wound, which lately did dispart2 Her bleeding brest, and riven bowels gor’d, Was closed up, as it had not beene sor’d,3 And every part to safety full sownd,4 As5 she were never hurt, was soone restor’d: Tho when she felt her selfe to be unbownd, And perfect hole,6 prostrate she fell unto the grownd.

39

Before faire Britomart, she fell prostrate, Saying, “Ah noble knight, what worthy meede Can wretched Lady, quitt7 from wofull state, Yield you in lieu of this your gracious deed;8 Your vertue selfe her owne reward shall breed,9 Even10 immortall prayse, and glory wyde Which I your vassall, by your prowesse freed, Shall through the world make to be notifyde, And goodly well advaunce that goodly well was tryde.”11

40

But Britomart uprearing her from grownd, Said, “Gentle Dame, reward enough I weene For many labours more, then I have found,

1

Abode: waited; end: result. dispart: divide. 3 sor’d: pained. 4 full sownd: fully healed. 2

5

As: as if. Goldberg discusses the odd pun: she is now perfectly whole; or she is now a perfect hole, vaginally at her husband’s service (78–9). 7 quitt: released. 6

8

in lieu of: to equal; as payment for. Amoret is vastly relieved and grateful, but she is also worried: she believes she has been rescued by a male knight, and the time-honored reward for a man who has saved one’s virtue is to give it to him. Cf. IV.i.5–8. 9

I.e., your virtue itself will breed its own reward. 10 Even: that is to say (OED adv 8). 11 advaunce: extol; that: that which (Britomart’s prowess and virtue); tryde: proved through being tested.

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239

This, that in safetie now I have you seene, And meane1 of your deliverance have beene: Henceforth faire Lady comfort to you take, And put away remembraunce of late teene; In sted thereof know, that your loving Make,2 Hath no lesse griefe endured for your gentle sake.” 41

She much was cheard to heare him mentiond, Whom of all living wightes she loved best. Then laid the noble Championesse strong hond Upon th’enchaunter, which had her3 distrest So sore, and with foule outrages opprest: With that great chaine, wherewith not long ygoe He bound that pitteous Lady prisoner, now relest,4 Himselfe she bound, more worthy to be so, And captive with her led to wretchednesse and wo.

42

Returning back,5 those goodly rowmes, which erst She saw so rich and royally arayd, Now vanisht utterly, and cleane subverst6 She found, and all their glory quite decayd, That sight of such a chaunge her much dismayd. Thenceforth descending to that perlous Porch, Those dreadfull flames she also found delayd,7 And quenched quite, like a consumed torch, That erst all entrers8 wont so cruelly to scorch.

43a

At last she came unto the place, where late She left Sir Scudamour in great distresse, Twixt dolour and despight halfe desperate, Of his loves succour, of his owne redresse,9 And of the hardie Britomarts successe: There on the cold earth him now thrown she found,

1

meane: the means. Make: mate. 3 her: until we reach line 6, this pronoun is nicely ambiguous. 4 The line has an extra metrical foot—making her release somehow superfluous? Or an overflowing boon? 2

5

Returning back: i.e., retracing her former path through the house. 6 subverst: razed. 7 delayd: quenched. 8 entrers: incomers. 9 redresse: aid (his to Amoret); reparation (Busirane’s to him, after having stolen his bridal property).

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In wilfull1 anguish, and dead heavinesse, And to him cald; whose voices knowen sound Soone as he heard, himself he reared light from ground. 44a

There did he see, that2 most on earth him joyd, His dearest love, the comfort of his dayes, Whose too long absence him had sore annoyd, And wearied his life with dull delayes: Straight he upstarted from the loathed layes,3 And to her ran with hasty egernesse, Like as a Deare, that greedily embayes4 In the coole soile,5 after long thirstinesse, Which he in chace endured hath, now nigh breathlesse.

45a

Lightly he clipt6 her twixt his armes twaine, And streightly7 did embrace her body bright, Her body, late the prison of sad paine, Now the sweet lodge of love and deare delight: But she faire Lady overcommen quight Of huge affection, did in pleasure melt,8 And in sweete ravishment9 pourd out her spright: No word they spake, nor earthly thing they felt, But like two senceles stocks10 in long embracement dwelt.

46a

Had ye them seene, ye would have surely thought, That they had beene that faire Hermaphrodite, Which that rich Romane of white marble wrought,11

1

wilfull: the word implies that at some level Scudamour may even be enjoying his own grief by now; at the very least, the word strengthens the idea that he has utterly given in to despair when he should be taking up arms against it. 2 that: that which, i.e., Amoret. 3 layes: ground. 4 embayes: plunges. 5 soile: pool of water. 6 clipt: clasped. 7 streightly: tightly. 8 The “huge affection” and melting suggest the mutual pleasure of orgasm.

9 ravishment: ecstasy—with the peripheral hint that her being taken away from herself is psychologically dangerous as well as psychologically pleasurable. 10 stocks: sticks of wood. 11 No particular Roman or statue has been identified, although Romans were fond of putting statues of Priapus—with a gigantically erect penis—in their private gardens and baths. Here, the narrator is comparing Amoret’s and Scudamour’s close embrace to a statue of an hermaphrodite, a person with genitalia of both sexes. The image comes from a Greek myth in which the nymph Salmacis loved the youth Hermaphroditus

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And in his costly Bath causd to bee site: So seemd those two, as growne together quite, That Britomart halfe envying their blesse,1 Was much empassiond in her gentle sprite, And to her selfe oft wisht like happinesse, In vaine she wisht, that fate n’ould2 let her yet possesse. 47a

Thus doe those lovers with sweet countervayle,3 Each other of loves bitter fruit despoile.4 But now my teme5 begins to faint and fayle, All woxen weary of their journall6 toyle: Therefore I will their sweatie yokes assoyle,7 At this same furrowes8 end, till a new day: And ye faire Swayns,9 after your long turmoyle, Now cease your worke, and at your pleasure play; Now cease your worke; to morrow is an holy day.

Finis. [The 1590 edition, which was published when Spenser had finished only Books One through Three, ends with the above stanzas, 43a–47a. The 1596 edition, which consists of Books One through Six, omits stanzas 43a through 47a above and substitutes the following three stanzas, 43b through 45b, to provide a transition into Book Four.]

so fervently that she asked the gods never to separate them—upon which the gods made their two bodies into one (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 4.285–388). Another Greek source is Plato’s Symposium, in which the character Aristophanes says that humans originally had two heads, four arms, four legs, and two sets of genitals. Some had two male sets of genitals, some two female, and some a set of each. But because this anatomy made humans strong enough to challenge the gods, the gods divided each human in two. Ever after, each human searches for his or her half, and upon finding that half, falls in love. The natural inclination to love someone of the same sex or of the opposite sex is determined by the sex with whom one was originally joined in one body (Plato 190b–193e).

1

blesse: bliss. n’ould: would not. 3 countervayle: reciprocation. 4 despoile: plunder. 5 The georgic metaphor is a common one, comparing the poet’s labor to that of a farmer who directs a team of oxen. 6 woxen: grown; journall: daily. 7 assoyle: release, with overtones of the meaning “absolve.” 8 The furrows offer a visual analogy for parallel lines of verse. 9 Amoret and Scudamour suddenly become georgic figures. 2

The Faerie Queene: Book Three

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1596 Ending 43b

More easie issew now, then entrance late She found: for now that fained dreadfull flame,1 Which chokt the porch of that enchaunted gate, And passage bard to all, that thither came, Was vanisht quite, as it were not the same, And gave her leave at pleasure2 forth to passe. Th’Enchaunter selfe, which all that fraud did frame, To have efforst3 the love of that faire lasse, Seeing his worke now wasted deepe engrieved was.

44b

But when the victoresse arrived there, Where late she left the pensife4 Scudamore, With her owne trusty Squire, both full of feare, Neither of them she found where she them lore:5 Thereat her noble hart was stonisht sore; But most faire Amoret, whose gentle spright Now gan to feede on hope, which she before Conceived had, to see her owne deare knight, Being thereof beguyld6 was fild with new affright.

45b

But he7 sad man, when he had long in drede Awayted there for Britomarts returne, Yet saw her not nor signe of her good speed,8 His expectation to despaire did turne, Misdeeming9 sure that her those flames did burne; And therefore gan advize with her old Squire,10

1

fained dreadfull flame: imaginary flame; flame imagined to be dreadful. 2 at pleasure: whenever she wished. 3 efforst: compelled. 4 pensife: apprehensive; sad. 5 lore: left.

6

beguyld: tricked; cheated; enchanted. he: Scudamour. 8 speed: success. 9 Misdeeming: mistakenly believing. 10 advize: consult; her old Squire: Glauce. 7

Canto Twelve

243

Who her deare nourslings losse no lesse did mourne, Thence to depart for further aide t’enquire: Where let them wend at will, whilest here I doe respire.1

1

respire: take a breather; rest from exertion. Spenser’s deletion of the neater ending of Book Three in favor of an open ending must make us ask about his attitudes toward endings in general, as Goldberg argues (Endlesse, passim). Yet the original ending can be seen as less than perfectly neat, given that it makes Amoret’s and Scudamour’s transition from self-tormenting anxiety to utter happiness uncomfortably abrupt (Stephens, 25–46). At the very least, the

deletion of the original ending allows Spenser to develop Britomart’s and Amoret’s relationship. Britomart saw Malecasta as someone monstrously unlike herself (i.62–3), but Busirane’s attempt to get her to avoid Amoret for similar reasons is defeated, and the cantos of Book Four in which Britomart and Amoret support each other are the fruit of that defeat.

Title page to the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23082)

TO THE MOST HIGH, MIGHTIE And MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE RENOVVMED FOR PIETIE, VERTVE, AND ALL GRATIOVS GOVERNMENT ELIZABETH BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND FRAVNCE AND IRELAND AND OF VIRGINIA, DEFENDOVR OF THE FAITH, &c. HER MOST HVMBLE SERVAVNT EDMVND SPENSER DOTH IN ALL HVMILITIE DEDICATE, PRESENT AND CONSECRATE THESE HIS LABOVRS TO LIVE VVITH THE ETERNITIE OF HER FAME.

THE FOVRTH BOOKE OF THE FAERIE QUEENE.

The Legend of

Containing CAMBEL and OR

OF FRIENDSHIP. 1

TELAMOND,

1

2

The rugged3 forhead that with grave foresight Welds kingdomes causes, and affaires of state,4 My looser rimes (I wote) doth sharply wite,5 For praising love, as I have done of late, And magnifying lovers deare debate;6

1 Cambel: the name comes from the character Cambal (or Cambalo) in Chaucer’s Squire’s Tale; Spenser recounts, adapts, and extends Chaucer’s version (beginning in ii.32); Telamond: everywhere else in Book Four, this character is called Triamond. It is useful, however, to know that Spenser was originally considering a name meaning “perfect world” (from the Greek τε´λειος and the Latin mundus; see Roche 1964, 16–7). 2 FRIENDSHIP: a civic virtue as well as a personal one, friendship was thought of as keeping the body politic united. McCoy observes that friendship was “the virtue the Order of the Garter was supposed to inculcate in its members” (McCoy, 134). 3 rugged: furrowed, as in a frown. 4 Welds: wields; manages. These lines most likely refer to criticism made of the first installment of The Faerie Queene by William Cecil, Lord Burghley, who was Queen Elizabeth’s Lord High Treasurer and trusted advisor. He was also, as McCabe points out, “one of the most senior members of the Order of the Garter” (208). Burghley would have learned about Spenser’s poem

by 1589, when Spenser traveled from Ireland to England and was allowed to read portions of his poem to the Queen at court. The first three books of the poem, published less than a year later, had as an appendix 17 sonnets dedicated to powerful people; the second of these sonnets is addressed, “To the right honourable the Lo. Burleigh Lo. high Threasurer of England”: TO you right noble Lord, whose carefull brest To menage of most grave affaires is bent, And on whose mightie shoulders most doth rest The burdein of this kingdomes governement, As the wide compasse of the firmament, On Atlas mighty shoulders is upstayd; Unfitly I these ydle rimes present, The labor of lost time, and wit unstayd Yet if their deeper sence be inly wayd, And the dim vele, with which from commune vew Their fairer parts are hid, aside be layd, Perhaps not vaine they may appeare to you. Such as they be, vouchsafe them to receave, And wipe their faults out of your censure grave. 5

looser: too loose; lightweight or licentious; wite: impute blame to; criticize. 6 magnifying: extolling; dilating upon; deare debate: loving or flirtatious arguments; emotionally costly arguments.

247

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By which fraile youth is oft to follie led, Through false allurement of that pleasing baite, That better were in vertues discipled,1 Then with vaine poemes weeds2 to have their fancies fed. 2

Such ones ill judge of love, that cannot love,3 Ne in their frosen hearts feele kindly flame: For thy they ought not thing unknowne reprove, Ne naturall affection faultlesse blame,4 For fault of few that have abusd the same. For it5 of honor and all vertue is The roote, and brings forth glorious flowres of fame, That crowne true lovers with immortall blis, The meed of them that love, and do not live amisse.

3

Which who so list looke backe to former ages, And call to count6 the things that then were donne, Shall find, that all the workes of those wise sages, And brave exploits which great Heroes7 wonne, In love were either ended or begunne: Witnesse the father of Philosophie,8 Which to his Critias,9 shaded oft from sunne, Of love full manie lessons did apply, The which these Stoicke censours10 cannot well deny.

1

discipled: taught; disciplined. Sidney had praised poetry for teaching morals through its sweet fictions; others criticized poetry for not being direct enough in its moralizing (Defence, 100–11). In “The Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser declares that his aim with this poem is “to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline” (“The Letter to Raleigh,” p. 451). 2 weeds: clothing; undesirable plants. 3 I.e., those who cannot love make poor judges of love. As Hamilton points out in his note, the criticism of Burghley is perhaps exaggerated, given his long and apparently strong marriage to Mildred Cecil. 4 Either “cannot blame natural and [therefore] faultless affection” or “cannot faultlessly blame natural affection.”

5

it: love. call to count: bring up for consideration. 7 Heroes were traditionally thought to be capable of great love, not only of persons, but of the ideals that prompted heroic deeds. 8 father of Philosophie: Socrates. 9 Critias: a mistake for Phaedrus, with whom Socrates discussed the philosophy of love in the shade of a tree (Plato, Phaedrus, 230b). 10 Stoicke censours: those who attempt to banish love in themselves and criticize it in others. 6

Proem

249

4

To such therefore I do not sing at all,1 But to that sacred Saint my soveraigne Queene, In whose chast breast all bountie2 naturall, And treasures of true love enlocked beene, Bove all her sexe that ever yet was seene; To her I sing of love, that loveth best, And best is lov’d of all alive I weene: To her this song most fitly is addrest, The Queene of love, and Prince of peace3 from heaven blest.

5

Which that she may the better deigne to heare, Do thou dred infant, Venus dearling dove,4 From her high spirit chase imperious feare,5 And use of awfull6 Majestie remove: In sted thereof with drops of melting love, Deawd with ambrosiall kisses, by thee7 gotten From thy sweete smyling mother from above, Sprinckle her heart, and haughtie courage8 soften, That she may hearke to love, and reade9 this lesson often.

1

With a sweeping gesture, the narrator sets Burghley and other critics aside. 2 bountie: excellence; generosity. 3 Queene of love: this title aligns Elizabeth with Venus; Prince of peace: this title aligns Elizabeth with the messiah whose coming is foretold in Isa. 9.6. 4 I.e., Cupid. 5 imperious feare: majesty that makes those around her afraid; the fear felt by a queen (presumably fear of hearing too much about—or experiencing—love). 6 awfull: awe-inspiring. 7 thee: Cupid. 8 her: Queen Elizabeth’s; haughtie courage: lofty heart, emotions, or bravery; emotional remoteness.

9 reade: almost every meaning of this word comes into play: is Spenser asking his queen to peruse his poem, learn its lessons, discern its truth, interpret it for those around her, or promulgate the lessons it teaches? If her breast is the source of “all bountie naturall” and yet she teaches or promulgates the lessons that she has learned from Cupid through Spenser’s poem, who is ventriloquizing though whom? Furthermore, exactly what is this lesson? Hamilton interprets it as “Cupid’s lesson, which is not to fear love,” but it is difficult to forget the horrific form that Cupid’s lesson took in the final canto of the previous book.

Canto One Fayre Britomart saves Amoret, Duessa1 discord breedes Twixt Scudamour and Blandamour:2 Their fight and warlike deedes.

1

Of lovers sad calamities of old, Full many piteous stories doe remaine, But none more piteous ever was ytold, Then that of Amorets hart-binding chaine, And this of Florimels unworthie3 paine: The deare compassion of whose bitter fit My softened heart so sorely doth constraine,4 That I with teares full oft doe pittie it, And oftentimes doe wish it never had bene writ.5

2

For from the time that Scudamour her bought6 In perilous fight, she never joyed day, A perilous fight when he with force her brought

1 Duessa: a character who does not appear in Book Three but is important for Books One, Two, Four, and Five. She first appears in I.ii.13. Her name means “double being” (Italian due + Latin esse); she usually goes disguised as a beautiful woman (I.ii.35), though she is actually a bald hag with withered breasts, rotten gums, one foot like an eagle’s claw, the other like a bear’s paw, and a fox’s tail covered in dung (I.viii.46–48). At various points in the poem, she represents deceit, self-delusion, witchcraft, the Whore of Babylon in the Book of Revelation, the Roman Catholic Church, and Mary, Queen of Scots. In Book One, Duessa seduces Redcrosse into believing she is a fit companion for him, which enables her to lead him into various types of error. Redcrosse finally sees her for what she is (I.viii.46–48), but in Book Two, Archimago uses her to

trick Guyon into believing temporarily that she has been raped by Redcrosse (II.i.8–30). 2 Scudamour: see III.vi.53 and notes; Blandamour: the name means “flattering lover” (Latin blandus + amor). 3 unworthie: undeserved. 4 constraine: press upon; distress. 5 As at III.viii.1 and III.viii.43.8, the narrator’s tearful distress over Florimell’s torments is humorously undercut by his relish in inventing those torments. The poem asks us to consider what distinguishes this relish from that of the torturer Busirane (see III.xii.31.2.n.). 6 her: Amoret; bought: freed by paying a price; redeemed; purchased. See Canto Ten for Scudamour’s account of his fight for, and abduction of, the reluctant Amoret.

250

Canto One

251

From twentie Knights, that did him all assay: Yet fairely1 well he did them all dismay: And with great glorie both the shield of love, And eke the Ladie selfe he brought away, Whom having wedded as did him behove,2 A new unknowen mischiefe did from him remove. 3

For that same vile Enchauntour Busyran, The very selfe same day that she was wedded, Amidst the bridale feast, whilest every man Surcharg’d with wine, were heedlesse and ill hedded, All bent to mirth before the bride was bedded,3 Brought in that mask of love which late was showen:4 And there the Ladie ill of friends bestedded,5 By way of sport, as oft in maskes is knowen, Conveyed quite away to living wight unknowen.

4

Seven moneths he so her kept in bitter smart, Because his sinfull lust she would not serve, Untill such time as noble Britomart Released her, that else was like to sterve,6 Through cruell knife that her deare heart did kerve.7 And now she is with her upon the way,

1

fairely: very; completely. behove: befit, be appropritate for; be useful for. 3 While the wedding guests were still celebrating, it was the custom for the bride to be ceremoniously conducted to the nuptial chamber, put into her nightgown, and arranged in bed to await the groom—to the accompaniment of prayers or bawdy jokes, as the case might be. The next morning, the bloodied wedding sheets were sometimes displayed from a window to prove that consummation had taken place. 4 See III.xii.Arg.1.n. for information about the custom of presenting masques at weddings. In terms of a logical, chronological plot, Busirane brings his masque to Amoret 2

and Scudamour’s wedding, abducts the bride in earnest rather than in jest, and then forces her to watch repeated performances of his masque while imprisoned in his house. Allegorically, however, one could say that Amoret’s anxieties about giving herself in marriage are what remove her psychologically from the wedding celebration and trap her inside her own mind, which compulsively replays horrifying fantasies. 5 I.e., badly looked after by her friends. This part of Amoret’s story is appropriate for the Book of Friendship. 6 sterve: die a lingering death. 7 kerve: cut; slice. For Britomart’s rescue of Amoret, see III.xii.

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Marching in lovely wise, that1 could deserve No spot of blame, though spite did oft assay To blot her with dishonor of so faire a pray.2 5

Yet should it be a pleasant tale, to tell The diverse usage and demeanure daint,3 That each to other made, as oft befell. For Amoret right fearefull was and faint, Lest she with blame her honor should attaint,4 That everie word did tremble as she spake, And everie looke was coy, and wondrous quaint,5 And everie limbe that touched her did quake: Yet could she not but curteous countenance6 to her make.

6

For well she wist, as true it was indeed, That her lives Lord and patrone7 of her health Right well deserved as his duefull8 meed, Her love, her service,9 and her utmost wealth. All is his justly, that all freely dealth:10 Nathlesse her honor dearer then her life, She sought to save, as thing reserv’d from stealth;11 Die had she lever with Enchanters knife, Then to be false in love, profest a virgine wife.

1

lovely: affectionate; that: who, i.e., Britomart. 2 pray: booty. Since she looks like a male knight, spiteful people who see her carrying Amoret on her horse spread the rumor that the two of them are engaging in premarital or extramarital sex. 3 diverse usage: different conduct (as becomes evident in 5.4–5 and 7.1–5, this phrase means that Amoret’s conduct toward Britomart differed from Britomart’s conduct toward Amoret); demeanure daint: delightful, careful, or fastidious demeanor. 4 attaint: taint; convict. 5 quaint: prim; ingenious—though one cannot help remembering that for Chaucer, “quainte,” meaning “clever,” was a homonym for “queinte,” meaning “a woman’s

external genitals” or “cunt” (The Miller’s Tale, 89–90). Amoret is, after all, “perfect hole” (III.xii.38.9 and note). 6 countenance: expression. 7 patrone: lord; protector. 8 duefull: due, rightful. 9 service: servitude; sexual favors. Cf. III.xii.39.4.n. 10 dealth: deals out, gives. Believing she has been rescued by a man, Amoret has a moral dilemma: the protocols of medieval chivalric romance demand that she reward her rescuer by giving herself to him, yet she is already married—and still a virgin, to boot. 11 reserv’d from stealth: preserved from being stolen.

Canto One

253

7

Thereto her feare was made so much the greater Through fine abusion1 of that Briton mayd: Who for to hide her fained sex2 the better, And maske3 her wounded mind, both did and sayd Full many things so doubtfull to be wayd,4 That well she5 wist not what by them to gesse, For other whiles to her she purpos6 made Of love, and otherwhiles7 of lustfulnesse, That much she8 feard his mind would grow to some excesse.

8

His will9 she feard; for him she surely thought To be a man, such as indeed he seemed, And much the more, by that10 he lately wrought, When her from deadly thraldome he redeemed, For which no service11 she too much esteemed, Yet dread of shame, and doubt of fowle dishonor Made her not yeeld so much, as due she deemed. Yet Britomart attended duly on her, As well became a knight, and did to her all honor.12

9

It so befell one evening, that they came Unto a Castell, lodged there to bee, Where many a knight, and many a lovely Dame Was then assembled, deeds of armes to see: Amongst all which was none more faire then shee,13 That many of them mov’d to eye her sore.14

1 fine abusion: clever or subtle deceit, misuse, or shameful treatment. 2 fained sex: pretended sex, with a pun on the sense “sex she wished she could be.” 3 maske: disguise or cover, with a pun on “masque,” by which she would represent her mind. 4 doubtfull to be wayd: ambiguous; difficult to judge. In order to maintain her cover, Britomart is deliberately flirting. 5 she: Amoret. 6 she: Britomart; purpos: conversation. 7 other whiles . . . otherwhiles: at times . . . at other times.

8

she: Amoret. will: sexual desire. 10 that: that which (referring to “his” manly triumph over Busirane). 11 service: helpful deed; sexual favors. 12 The feminine rhyme asks us to compare “on her” (with its bawdy overtones) to “honor.” 13 shee: Amoret (since no one can see Britomart through her armor). 14 sore: sorely, enviously. 9

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The custome of that place was such, that hee Which had no love nor lemman there in store,1 Should either winne him one, or lye without the dore.2 10

Amongst the rest there was a jolly knight, Who being asked for his love, avow’d That fairest Amoret was his by right, And offred that to justifie alowd.3 The warlike virgine seeing his so prowd And boastfull chalenge, wexed inlie wroth, But for the present did her anger shrowd; And sayd, her love to lose she was full loth, But either he should neither of them have, or both.4

11

So foorth they went, and both together giusted;5 But that same younker6 soone was overthrowne, And made repent, that he had rashly lusted For thing unlawfull, that was not his owne: Yet since he seemed valiant, though unknowne, She that7 no lesse was courteous then stout, Cast how to salve, that both the custome showne8 Were kept, and yet that Knight not locked out,9 That seem’d full hard t’accord two things so far in dout.

12

The Seneschall10 was cal’d to deeme the right, Whom she requir’d,11 that first fayre Amoret Might be to her allow’d, as to a Knight, That did her win and free from chalenge set: Which straight to her was yeelded without let.12

1

in store: at hand. Unlike most other castles in the poem, this one is not given a specific name. David Lee Miller calls it “the Castle of Compulsory Heterosexuality” (forthcoming). 3 alowd: i.e., to proclaim his rights publicly. 4 An important critical question is whether Britomart wants Amoret, wants only to free Amoret from being claimed by various people as a tournament prize, or wants to free (or claim) herself through Amoret. 5 giusted: jousted. 2

6

younker: young man of high rank. that: who. 8 showne: made known. 9 I.e., Britomart tries to figure out how both to observe the custom of the castle and to allow the knight whom she has defeated to come inside. 10 Seneschall: steward; officer of a household appointed to adjudicate domestic disputes and infractions. 11 I.e., of whom Britomart requested. 12 let: hindrance. 7

Canto One

255

Then since that strange Knights love from him was quitted,1 She claim’d that to her selfe, as Ladies det, He as a Knight might justly be admitted;2 So none should be out shut, sith all of loves were fitted.3 13

With that her glistring helmet she unlaced; Which doft, her golden lockes, that were up bound Still in a knot, unto her heeles downe traced,4 And like a silken veile in compasse5 round About her backe and all her bodie wound: Like as the shining skie in summers night, What time6 the dayes with scorching heat abound, Is creasted all with lines of firie light, That it prodigious7 seemes in common peoples sight.

14

Such when those Knights and Ladies all about Beheld her, all were with amazement smit, And every one gan grow in secret dout Of this and that, according to each wit: Some thought that some enchantment faygned it; Some, that Bellona8 in that warlike wise To them appear’d, with shield and armour fit; Some, that it was a maske9 of strange disguise: So diversely each one did sundrie doubts devise.

1

quitted: gone. In claiming Amoret, Britomart claims the reward due to a victorious man, but since the acquisition of that reward still leaves her with “no love nor lemman” (9.8), she claims the male knight, as well. She does not intend to make him her love or leman, but she has made use of the onlookers’ sense of heterosexual propriety to satisfy her own sense of military propriety (in that she considers the knight valiant enough to be well treated even though he has lost the match). 3 fitted: provided. 4 traced: passed—though this verb most often indicates the braiding of hair rather 2

than the loosening of it. This is the third time that Britomart has unveiled, revealing her sex; see III.i.42–3 and III.ix.20–24. 5 in compasse: encompassing, surrounding. 6 What time: when. 7 prodigious: portentious; ominous. 8 Bellona: the goddess of battle. 9 maske: masque, costumed performance (see III.xii.Arg.1.n.). It is not entirely clear whether this subset of onlookers thinks that the masque consists of a woman dressing in a man’s armor or of a man pulling off his armor to reveal himself dressed and wigged as a woman. What is quite clear is that all of the onlookers feel bewildered.

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15

But that young Knight, which through her1 gentle deed Was to that goodly fellowship restor’d, Ten thousand thankes did yeeld her for her meed, And doubly overcommen, her ador’d:2 So did they all their former strife accord; And eke fayre Amoret now freed from feare, More franke affection did to her afford, And to her bed, which she was wont forbeare, Now freely drew, and found right safe assurance theare.3

16

Where all that night they of their loves did treat,4 And hard adventures twixt themselves alone, That each the other gan with passion great, And griefull pittie privately bemone.5 The morow next so soone as Titan shone, They both uprose, and to their waies6 them dight: Long wandred they, yet never met with none, That to their willes7 could them direct aright, Or to them tydings tell, that mote their harts delight.

17

Lo thus they rode, till at the last they spide Two armed Knights, that toward them did pace, And ech of them had ryding by his side A Ladie, seeming in so farre a space,8

1

young Knight: the one with whom Britomart jousted for Amoret; her: Britomart’s. 2 ador’d: the word’s religious overtones register the inappropriate swiftness of the knight’s falling in love, even though Britomart is an appropriately admirable object of love. 3 In a world without central heating or inexpensive furniture, almost no one slept alone. 4 treat: converse. 5 griefull: sorrowful. The two women are sharing their hard-luck stories about the emotional pain of searching for their two male beloveds, but the location of the conversation—in bed—and the words “passion” and “privately bemone” illogically but powerfully evoke the idea of two

women having sex with each other. Spenser is fond of setting up such conditionally erotic passages, but one could say that this is one of the few bed scenes in the poem about which the readers are asked to be happy. (Hellenore is happy with the satyrs, and Malecasta is at first happy to lie with Britomart, but the narrative does not encourage us to celebrate either event.) The mastery that Britomart has wielded over Amoret disappears for this night, and the two women at least temporarily find what they are seeking in each other. 6 waies: the plural may reflect the fact that although they are traveling with each other (as stanza 17 makes clear), their goals differ. 7 I.e., toward their goals. 8 I.e., someone who seemed, from that far off, to be a lady (a highborn woman).

Canto One

257

But Ladies none they were, albee1 in face And outward shew faire semblance they did beare; For under maske of beautie and good grace, Vile treason and fowle falshood hidden were, That mote to none but to the warie wise appeare. 18

The one of them the false Duessa hight, That now had chang’d her former wonted hew: For she could d’on so manie shapes in sight, As ever could Cameleon colours new; So could she forge all colours, save2 the trew. The other no whit better was then shee, But that such as she was, she plaine did shew;3 Yet otherwise much worse, if worse might bee, And dayly more offensive unto each degree.4

19

Her name was Ate,5 mother of debate, And all dissention, which doth dayly grow Amongst fraile men, that many a publike state And many a private oft doth overthrow. Her false Duessa who full well did know, To be most fit to trouble noble knights, Which hunt for honor, raised from below,6 Out of the dwellings of the damned sprights, Where she in darknes wastes her cursed daies and nights.

1

albee: albeit. save: except for. 3 I.e., she was better only in that she revealed honestly how bad she was. She is described in stanza 17 as being “faire” in “outward semblance,” but she is often later called a hag (e.g., at i.31.1 and ii.12.5), and at iv.9–10, it is clear that everyone regards her elderly appearance with loathing. The inconsistencies are part and parcel with her nature, which not only is duplicitous, but preys upon people’s ability to delude themselves even when confronted with the truth. 4 unto each degree: to people of every social class. 5 Ate: in the Iliad, Ate is the eldest daughter of Zeus, thrown by him out of heaven onto 2

the earth. She blinds people’s judgment in order to bring them affliction, and she is described as trampling men’s skulls (Iliad, 19.91–128). In Hesiod’s Theogony, Ate is the great-granddaughter of Chaos, descended through Night and Strife (Theogony, 230). Cf. also Allecto in the Aeneid (7.435–55). Spenser identifies Ate’s origin as hell and makes her into the personification of Discord, the chief enemy of the virtue of Friendship. Stanzas 19 through 30 digress from the plot to describe her dwelling and habits, in one of Spenser’s most evocative renderings of an emblematic architectural space. 6 I.e., Duessa knew that Ate was best able to trouble knights who hunt for honor, Ate being raised from hell.

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20

Hard by1 the gates of hell her dwelling is, There whereas all the plagues and harmes abound, Which punish wicked men, that walke amisse: It is a darksome delve2 farre under ground, With thornes and barren brakes3 environd round, That none the same may easily out win; Yet many waies to enter may be found, But none to issue forth when one is in: For discord harder is to end then to begin.

21

And all within the riven walls were hung With ragged monuments4 of times forepast, All which the sad effects of discord sung: There were rent robes, and broken scepters plast, Altars defyl’d, and holy things defast,5 Disshivered speares, and shields ytorne in twaine, Great cities ransackt, and strong castles rast,6 Nations captived, and huge armies slaine: Of all which ruines there some relicks did remaine.7

22

There was the signe of antique Babylon, Of fatall Thebes, of Rome that raigned long, Of sacred Salem, and sad Ilion,8

1

Hard by: right by. delve: cave. 3 brakes: bracken, ferns; briars. 4 monuments: souvenirs, reminders; tributes. Here and elsewhere, Spenser is acutely aware of the etymological relationship of the word “monument” (which he often spells “moniment”) to the word “admonishment.” Monuments serve to remind us of past glories so that we may imitate them— and of past follies so that we may avoid them. Ate’s house is thus the result of her power, a museum to that power, and a possible deterrent to that power’s success. Yet these twelve stanzas demonstrate that humans are more likely to contribute to Ate’s collection than to take lessons from it. 5 Although this line refers generally to the religious desecrations of all wars, and although Spenser might well be thinking, for example, of the passage in the Aeneid in 2

which Priam is murdered in front of an altar (2.547–53), there were also numerous defaced churches to be seen in England after Henry VIII broke with the Pope, dissolved the English monasteries, and ransacked their properties in the late 1530s. 6

rast: razed. The stanza progresses smoothly from describing a wall hung with trophies of war to describing some of war’s aftereffects that could not possibly be contained in one room. It then slips into a description of the actions of the wars themselves. The final line brings us back to mere relics of those wars, but the total effect is of a room that encloses a howling chaos, bringing great stretches of geography and time into the “riven” confines of its walls. 8 The Jewish scriptures represent Babylon (the capital of Babylonia, in present-day Iraq) as the place to which the Babylonian 7

Canto One

259

For memorie of which on high there hong The golden Apple, cause of all their wrong, For which the three faire Goddesses did strive:1 There also was the name of Nimrod 2 strong, Of Alexander, and his Princes five,3 Which shar’d to them the spoiles that he had got alive. 23

And there the relicks of the drunken fray, The which amongst the Lapithees befell, And of the bloodie feast, which sent away So many Centaures drunken soules to hell, That under great Alcides furie fell:4 And of the dreadfull discord, which did drive The noble Argonauts5 to outrage fell, That each of life sought others to deprive, All mindlesse of the Golden fleece, which made them strive.6

king Nebuchadnezzar II exiled the Jews. Jerusalem (Salem), by contrast, was the Jews’ chosen—and lost—home. According to numerous mythologies, Thebes, in ancient Egypt, was “fatall” because its king, Laius, was told by an oracle that he was destined to be killed by his own son, Oedipus. Raised by a shepherd, Oedipus did not know his own parents, and so could not know that a robber he killed was his own father or that the woman whom he then married was his own mother. When he discovered his unwitting errors, Oedipus put out his own eyes. Ilion (Troy) was the site of the Trojan War and supposedly the origin of the British race after the fall of Troy scattered its people (see III.iii.22.6.n. and III.iii.26.2.n.). 1

See III.ix.34.9.n. for the story of how the Goddess of Discord used a golden apple to start the Trojan War. 2 Nimrod: a giant and king of Babel, believed by Renaissance theologians to be responsible for the building of the Tower of Babel. Because the people’s intention in building the tower toward heaven was to make themselves great, God punished and weakened them by dividing humans into various language groups who were unable to

communicate with each other (Gen. 10–1). 3 For the story of Alexander the Great, see 1 Macc. 1.7–8, according to which the division of Alexander’s kingdom brought evils upon the earth. 4 Like other contemporary mythographers, Spenser combines his account of the battle between the Greek Lapiths and the Centaurs (when the Centaurs attempted to carry off the Lapith women during a wedding feast) with his account of the battle between Hercules (Alcides) and the Centaurs; see Ovid, Metamorphoses, 12.210–535 and 536–41. 5 Argonauts: in Greek mythology, when Pelias took the throne that rightfully belonged to Jason, he got Jason out of the way by commanding him to fetch the fabled— and fabulously guarded—golden ram’s fleece of Colchis. Jason and volunteers from all over Greece sailed in the ship Argo to Colchis and back, undergoing many trials in order to claim the fleece. 6 strive: work assiduously toward a goal; engage in war. In Book Four, Spenser plays with the relationship between these two meanings.

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24

And eke of private persons many moe, That were too long a worke to count them all; Some of sworne friends, that did their faith forgoe; Some of borne brethren, prov’d unnaturall;1 Some of deare lovers, foes perpetuall: Witnesse their broken bandes there to be seene, Their girlonds rent, their bowres despoyled all; The moniments whereof there byding beene,2 As plaine as at the first, when they were fresh and greene.

25

Such was her house within; but all without, The barren ground was full of wicked weedes, Which she her selfe had sowen all about, Now growen great, at first of little seedes, The seedes of evill wordes, and factious deedes; Which when to ripenesse due they growen arre, Bring foorth an infinite increase, that breedes Tumultuous trouble and contentious jarre,3 The which most often end in bloudshed and in warre.4

26

And those same cursed seedes doe also serve To her for bread, and yeeld her living food:5 For life it is to her, when others sterve6 Through mischievous debate, and deadly feood,7 That she may sucke their life, and drinke their blood, With which she from her childhood had bene fed. For she at first was borne of hellish brood, And by infernall furies nourished, That by her monstrous shape might easily be red.

27

Her face most fowle and filthy was to see, With squinted eyes contrarie wayes intended,8 And loathly mouth, unmeete a mouth to bee,

1

unnaturall: in breaking the bonds that are natural among siblings. 2 byding beene: abide. 3 jarre: discord. 4 Cf. the Garden of Adonis, III.vi. McCabe compares Ate’s tumultuous garden with that in which Spenser worked: the garden that was Ireland (McCabe, 77).

5

Cf. John 6.41–58, in which Jesus tells his listeners to stop disputing among themselves and to believe that he is the bread and blood of life, which makes the eater and drinker immortal. 6 sterve: die. 7 feood: feud. 8 intended: directed.

Canto One

261

That nought but gall and venim comprehended,1 And wicked wordes that God and man offended: Her lying tongue was in two parts divided, And both the parts did speake, and both contended; And as her tongue, so was her hart discided, That never thoght one thing, but doubly stil was guided. 28

Als2 as she double spake, so heard she double, With matchlesse3 eares deformed and distort, Fild with false rumors and seditious trouble, Bred in assemblies of the vulgar sort, That still are led with every light report.4 And as her eares so eke her feet were odde,5 And much unlike, th’one long, the other short, And both misplast; that when th’one forward yode, The other backe retired, and contrarie trode.6

29

Likewise unequall were her handes twaine, That7 one did reach, the other pusht away, That one did make, the other mard againe, And sought to bring all things unto decay; Whereby great riches gathered manie a day, She in short space did often bring to nought, And their possessours often did dismay. For all her studie was and all her thought, How she might overthrow the things that Concord wrought.

30

So much her malice did her might surpas, That even th’Almightie selfe she did maligne, Because to man so mercifull he was, And unto all his creatures so benigne, Sith she her selfe was of his grace indigne:8

1

comprehended: enclosed. Als: also. 3 matchlesse: mismatched. 4 light report: careless or frivolous rumor. 5 odde: unlike each other. 6 Naturally, one cannot walk this way without splitting oneself apart. Ate’s self2

contradictory nature, which should render her unable to move, much less able to effect her designs, effects those designs purely by its being: thwarting herself, she is the personification and source of all self-thwarting. 7 That: whatever, that which. 8 indigne: undeserving.

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For all this worlds faire workmanship1 she tride, Unto his last confusion2 to bring, And that great golden chaine3 quite to divide, With which it blessed Concord hath together tide. 31

Such was that hag, which with Duessa roade, And serving her in her malitious use, To hurt good knights, was as it were her baude,4 To sell her borrowed beautie to abuse.5 For though like withered tree, that wanteth juyce, She old and crooked were, yet now of late, As fresh and fragrant as the floure deluce6 She was become, by chaunge of her estate,7 And made full goodly joyance8 to her new found mate.

32

Her mate he was a jollie youthfull knight, That bore great sway in armes and chivalrie, And was indeed a man of mickle might: His name was Blandamour, that did descrie9 His fickle mind full of inconstancie. And now himselfe he fitted10 had right well, With two companions of like qualitie, Faithlesse Duessa, and false Paridell, That whether11 were more false, full hard it is to tell.

1

this worlds faire workmanship: both the natural world, as evidence of God’s master craft, and the work that human hands produce using God-given talents. In the following canto, Spenser will further develop the idea that Ate wants to destroy human art, which is a repository of the sorts of understanding that could counteract her discordant power. (See ii.33.5.n.) 2 his: its; confusion: ruin. 3 golden chaine: see I.ix.1.1. When the gods in the Iliad quarrel over which mortals should win the Trojan War, Zeus angrily tells them to stop interfering. To demonstrate his power, he tells them that if they let down a golden chain from heaven and combine their forces to try to pull him down, they will not succeed, but that he

could pull up all of them—along with the whole earth and sea—and dangle the whole mass from Mount Olympus (Iliad, 8.18–27). The golden chain between heaven and earth was interpreted as representing cosmic concord. 4 baude: bawd, pimp. 5 to abuse: (v.) to defile sexually; (n.) into sexual defilement. 6 floure deluce: fleur-de-lis, a white iris associated with chastity. 7 I.e., change of her condition, now having a mate. 8 joyance: sexual dalliance. 9 that did descrie: which name revealed. 10 fitted: provided. 11 whether: which.

Canto One

33

Now when this gallant with his goodly crew, From farre espide the famous Britomart, Like knight adventurous in outward vew, With his faire paragon, his conquests part,1 Approching nigh, eftsoones his2 wanton hart Was tickled with delight, and jesting sayd; “Lo there Sir Paridel, for your desart, Good lucke presents you with yond lovely mayd, For pitie that ye want a fellow for your ayd.”

34

By that the lovely paire drew nigh to hond: Whom when as Paridel more plaine beheld, Albee in heart he like affection fond, Yet mindfull how he late by one was feld, That did those armes and that same scutchion3 weld, He had small lust to buy his love so deare, But answerd, “Sir him wise I never held, That having once escaped perill neare, Would afterwards afresh the sleeping evill reare.

35

“This knight too late his manhood4 and his might, I did assay, that me right dearely cost, Ne list I for revenge provoke new fight, Ne for light Ladies love, that soone is lost.” The hot-spurre5 youth so scorning to be crost, “Take then to you this Dame of mine” (quoth hee)

1

Lines 3 and 4 are absolutely ambiguous as to whether they refer to Blandamour accompanied by Duessa or to Britomart accompanied by Amoret. As a result, the lines must refer to both pairs, inviting us to decide how much Spenser is contrasting Britomart’s seeming with that of Blandamour and Duessa and how much he is inviting us to compare them. (Like Duessa and Ate in stanza 17, Britomart appears from far off to be what she is not: in this case, a knight with a woman whom he has won in battle.) 2 his: Blandamour’s. 3 scutchion: shield. For the earlier encounter between Paridell and Britomart, see III.ix.14–16.

263

4 manhood: Paridell saw Britomart take off her armor in Malbecco’s house, and we know that he was not blind to the fact that she was a woman, given the narrator’s comment that despite Paridell’s chagrin at having been felled by a female knight, he began to adore her beauty (III.ix.21–25). What his reference to Britomart’s “manhood” means here is a matter for interpretation: does he restore some of his own dignity by remaking his vanquisher into a man; does he mislead Blandamour for some other reason; or does his language reflect his conviction that Britomart, though a woman, is masculine? 5 hot-spurre: impetuous, as being always ready to spur on his horse.

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“And I without your perill or your cost, Will chalenge yond same other for my fee:”1 So forth he fiercely prickt, that one him scarce could see. 36

The warlike Britonesse her soone addrest, And with such uncouth2 welcome did receave Her fayned Paramour, her forced guest, That being forst his saddle soone to leave, Him selfe he did of his new love deceave:3 And made him selfe thensample of his follie. Which done, she passed forth not taking leave, And left him now as sad, as whilome jollie, Well warned to beware with whom he dar’d to dallie.

37

Which when his other companie beheld, They to his succour ran with readie ayd: And finding him unable once to weld,4 They reared him on horsebacke, and upstayd,5 Till on his way they had him forth convayd: And all the way with wondrous griefe of mynd, And shame, he shewd him selfe to be dismayd, More for the love which he had left behynd, Then that which he had to Sir Paridel resynd.6

38

Nathlesse he forth did march well as he might, And made good semblance to his companie, Dissembling his disease7 and evill plight; Till that ere long they chaunced to espie Two other knights, that towards them did ply8 With speedie course, as bent9 to charge them new. Whom when as Blandamour approching nie, Perceiv’d to be such as they seemd in vew, He was full wo, and gan his former griefe renew.

1

I.e., will claim yonder woman for my prize. 2 uncouth: rude. 3 I.e., he cheats himself out of Amoret— and of Britomart, though he does not know that he is dallying with two women rather than one.

4

once to weld: even to move. upstayd: propped him up. 6 He is not so utterly benighted as not to recognize Amoret’s worth. 7 disease: physical uneasiness, pain. 8 ply: direct their course. 9 bent: aiming. 5

Canto One

39

For th’one of them he perfectly descride, To be Sir Scudamour, by that1 he bore The God of love, with wings displayed wide,2 Whom mortally he3 hated evermore, Both for his worth, that4 all men did adore, And eke because his love he wonne by right: Which when he5 thought, it grieved him full sore, That through the bruses of his former fight, He now unable was to wreake his old despight.

40

For thy he thus to Paridel bespake, “Faire Sir, of friendship let me now you pray, That as I late adventured for your sake, The hurts whereof me now from battell stay, Ye will me now with like good turne repay, And justifie my cause on yonder knight.” “Ah Sir” (said Paridel) “do not dismay Your selfe for this, my selfe will for you fight, As ye have done for me: the left hand rubs the right.”6

41

With that he put his spurres unto his steed, With speare in rest, and toward him did fare, Like shaft out of a bow preventing speed.7 But Scudamour was shortly well aware Of his approch, and gan him selfe prepare Him to receive with entertainment meete. So furiously they met, that either bare8 The other downe under their horses feete, That what of them became, themselves did scarsly weete.

1

by that: because. I.e., Cupid is pictured on Scudamour’s shield, tunic, and/or pennon, as his coat of arms. Glauce is still with Scudamour, as is made clear by stanzas 50 through 54. She left Busirane’s house with him after the two of them gave up hoping that Britomart would emerge with Amoret (III.xii. 44b–45b). 3 Whom: Scudamour, but also in a sense Cupid; he: Blandamour. 2

4

265

that: whom (referring to Scudamour); which (referring to Scudamour’s worth). 5 he: Blandamour. 6 Paridell is defining their particular form of friendship. 7 preventing speed: surpassing speed itself. 8 either bare: each bore.

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42

As when two billowes in the Irish sowndes,1 Forcibly driven with contrarie tydes Do meete together, each abacke rebowndes With roaring rage; and dashing on all sides, That filleth all the sea with fome, divydes The doubtfull current into divers2 wayes: So fell those two in spight of both their prydes, But Scudamour himselfe did soone uprayse, And mounting light his foe for lying long upbrayes.3

43

Who rolled on an heape lay still in swound, All carelesse of his taunt and bitter rayle,4 Till that the rest him seeing lie on ground, Ran hastily, to weete what did him ayle. Where finding that the breath gan him to fayle, With busie care they strove him to awake, And doft his helmet, and undid his mayle:5 So much they did, that at the last they brake His slomber, yet so mazed, that he nothing spake.

44

Which when as Blandamour beheld, he sayd, “False faitour Scudamour, that hast by slight6 And foule advantage this good Knight dismayd, A Knight much better then thy selfe behight,7 Well falles it thee that I am not in plight8 This day, to wreake the dammage by thee donne: Such is thy wont, that still when any Knight Is weakned, then thou doest him overronne: So hast thou to thy selfe false honour often wonne.”

45

He little answer’d, but in manly heart His mightie indignation did forbeare,9 Which was not yet so secret, but some part

1 sowndes: (n.) wide bodies of water that connect still larger bodies of water; (v.) makes noise. As an English official living in occupied Ireland, Spenser would have had ample opportunity to observe opposing waves being driven against each other, literally and figuratively. 2 divers: separate, various.

3

I.e., and mounting easily, upbraided his foe for lying down so long. 4 carelesse of: oblivious to, unmindful of; rayle: railing. 5 mayle: chain mail. 6 faitour: impostor; slight: trickery. 7 behight: named, considered, esteemed. 8 in plight: in condition. 9 forbeare: restrain.

Canto One

267

Thereof did in his frouning face appeare: Like as a gloomie cloud, the which doth beare An hideous storme, is by the Northerne blast Quite overblowne, yet doth not passe so cleare, But that it all the skie doth overcast With darknes dred, and threatens all the world to wast. 46

“Ah gentle knight,”1 then false Duessa sayd, “Why do ye strive for Ladies love so sore, Whose chiefe desire is love and friendly aid Mongst gentle Knights to nourish evermore? Ne be ye wroth Sir Scudamour therefore, That she your love list love another knight, Ne do your selfe dislike a whit the more; For Love is free, and led with selfe delight, Ne will enforced be with maisterdome or might.”2

47

So false Duessa, but vile Ate thus; “Both foolish knights, I can but laugh at both, That strive and storme with stirre3 outrageous, For her that each of you alike doth loth, And loves another, with whom now she goth In lovely wise, and sleepes, and sports, and playes; Whilest both you here with many a cursed oth, Sweare she is yours, and stirre up bloudie frayes, To win a willow bough, whilest other weares the bayes.”4

48

“Vile hag” (sayd Scudamour) “why dost thou lye? And falsly seekst a vertuous wight to shame?” “Fond knight” (sayd she) “the thing that with this eye I saw, why should I doubt to tell the same?” “Then tell” (quoth Blandamour) “and feare no blame, Tell what thou saw’st, maulgre who so it heares.” “I saw” (quoth she) “a stranger knight, whose name I wote not well, but in his shield he beares (That well I wote) the heads of many broken speares.5

1

Duessa is speaking to Blandamour. maisterdome: mastery. Cf. III.i.25.7–9, Britomart’s version of this aphorism. 3 stirre: commotion. 4 Willow was the sign of an unhappy lover. In the ancient world, victors in athletics, 2

battles, and poetry contests were crowned with bay laurel leaves. 5 The knight’s shield is studded with the broken-off heads of foes’ spears, giving proof of—and forming an emblem of—the knight’s prowess in battle.

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49

“I saw him have your Amoret at will,1 I saw him kisse, I saw him her embrace, I saw him sleepe with her all night his fill, All manie nights, and manie by in place,2 That present were to testifie the case.” Which when as Scudamour did heare, his heart Was thrild with inward griefe, as when in chace The Parthian strikes a stag with shivering3 dart, The beast astonisht stands in middest of his smart.

50

So stood Sir Scudamour, when this he heard, Ne word he had to speake for great dismay, But lookt on Glauce grim,4 who woxe afeard Of outrage for the words, which she heard say, Albee untrue she wist them by assay.5 But Blandamour, whenas he did espie His chaunge of cheere, that anguish did bewray,6 He woxe full blithe, as he had got thereby, And gan thereat to triumph without victorie.

1 Here we begin to suspect we know the identity of this knight. 2 in place: there. 3

shivering: quivering; having the power to split what it hits. 4 Believing that the knight who rescued Amoret from Busirane’s house was male (see III.xi.13–27), Scudamour is easily persuaded that the strange knight has taken Amoret for himself rather than returning her to her husband. He knows that Glauce is the strange knight’s squire, so because the strange knight is not present, Scudamour directs his anger at Glauce. At the same time, the narrative suggests that he is redirecting some of the anger he feels against himself by projecting his faults onto Glauce. Just as Scudamour stood by while another knight rescued his lady, he believes that Glauce has stood by while the knight has stolen Amoret. The narrative has hinted earlier that jealousy is one of Scudamour’s failings: although the canto in which Scud-

amour enters the poem begins by banishing the “Hatefull hellish snake” of jealousy, the stanza that describes the banished jealousy functions as occultatio, declaring that something is absent while yet describing it so powerfully that we experience it as a presence (III.xi.1). Spenser does not tell us whether Scudamour believes that the sexual intercourse between Amoret and the strange knight was rape or whether Scudamour is quick to mistrust Amoret as soon as he hears Duessa’s tale; however, given the allegorical significance of a virgin’s inability to fend off attackers, giving credit even to the idea that Amoret was forcibly raped betrays Scudamour’s lack of trust in the strength of Amoret’s chastity. 5 Duessa’s words are actually true—though not in the crude sense in which she means them or in which Glauce interprets them. 6 I.e., when he noticed Scudamour’s change of mood, which was revealed by (or which revealed) Scudamour’s anguish.

Canto One

51

“Lo recreant”1 (sayd he) “the fruitlesse end Of thy vaine boast, and spoile of love misgotten, Whereby the name of knight-hood thou dost shend, And all true lovers with dishonor blotten, All things not rooted well, will soone be rotten.” “Fy fy2 false knight” (then false Duessa cryde) “Unworthy life that love with guile hast gotten, Be thou, where ever thou do go or ryde, Loathed of ladies all, and of all knights defyde.”

52

But Scudamour for passing great despight Staid not to answer, scarcely did refraine, But that in all those knights and ladies sight, He for revenge had guiltlesse Glauce slaine:3 But being past, he thus began amaine;4 “False traitour squire, false squire, of falsest knight, Why doth mine hand from thine avenge5 abstaine, Whose Lord hath done my love this foule despight? Why do I not it wreake, on thee now in my might?

53

“Discourteous, disloyall Britomart, Untrue to God, and unto man unjust, What vengeance due can equall6 thy desart, That hast with shamefull spot of sinfull lust Defil’d the pledge committed to thy trust? Let ugly shame and endlesse infamy Colour thy name with foule reproaches rust.7 Yet thou false Squire his fault shalt deare aby, And with thy punishment his penance shalt supply.”

1

recreant: coward. Fy fy: shame on you! (speaking to Scudamour). 3 I.e., he didn’t take the time to answer and could scarcely control himself; if he hadn’t been in sight of all of those knights and ladies, he would have slain the guiltless Glauce. Alternatively: he didn’t take the time to answer and could scarcely restrain himself from slaying the guiltless Glauce in the sight of all of those knights and ladies. 2

4

269

being past: this enraged loss of selfmastery having passed; amaine: vehemently. 5 thine avenge: avenging myself upon you. 6 equall: repay. 7 As Hamilton points out in his note, Scudamour is redirecting the reproaches that Blandamour and Duessa heaped upon him at stanza 51.3–9.

270 54

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The aged Dame him seeing so enraged, Was dead with feare, nathlesse as neede required, His flaming furie sought to have assuaged With sober words, that sufferance1 desired, Till time the tryall of her truth expyred:2 And evermore sought Britomart to cleare. But he the more with furious rage was fyred, And thrise his hand to kill her did upreare, And thrise he drew it backe: so did at last forbeare.3

sufferance: forbearance. I.e., until the passage of time brings to an end this trial of Britomart’s honesty, when evidence of that honesty will appear. Note that Glauce withholds the knowledge that could save her life and ease Scudamour’s mind: that the knight who rescued Amoret is female. Whether she suspects he would not believe her or whether she decides he could benefit from remaining in torment a 2

while longer is a matter of interpretation. Cf. Britomart’s decision temporarily to keep Amoret in anxiety about her rescuer’s sex (stanza 7). 3 The image recalls the ending of the Aeneid, when Aeneas pauses indecisively with his sword hovering over the fallen Turnus, until a fresh surge of burning fury (furiis accensus) causes him to plunge the blade into Turnus’ breast (Aeneid, 12.938–51).

Canto Two Blandamour winnes false Florimell, Paridell for her strives, They are accorded: Agape1 doth lengthen her sonnes lives.

1

Firebrand of hell first tynd in Phlegeton,2 By thousand furies, and from thence out throwen Into this world, to worke confusion,3 And set it all on fire by force unknowen, Is wicked discord,4 whose small sparkes once blowen None but a God or godlike man can slake;5 Such as was Orpheus, that when strife was growen Amongst those famous ympes6 of Greece, did take His silver Harpe in hand, and shortly friends them make.7

2

1

Or such as that celestiall Psalmist was, That when the wicked feend8 his Lord tormented, With heavenly notes, that did all other pas, The outrage of his furious fit relented.9 Such Musicke is wise words with time concented,10 To moderate stiffe11 minds, disposd to strive:

Agape: charity, the love characteristic of friendship (Greek). 2 tynd: kindled; Phlegeton: a river of fire in the underworld. 3 confusion: ruin. 4 “Discord” is the main grammatical subject of the whole stanza. 5 slake: abate. 6 ympes: youths (the Argonauts; see i.23.7.n.). 7 The first example of a “God or godlike man” who can quell others’ discord is Orpheus, whose skill with the lyre made all of the Greeks stop to listen. The musical concord (i.e., harmony) of his notes dispelled their interpersonal discord. During the

Renaissance, Orpheus was held up as the epitome of a skilled and inspired poet. 8 wicked feend: evil spirit—a description of Saul’s mental illness. 9 relented: relieved, ameliorated. The second “God or godlike man” is David, whose skill with the lyre eased Saul’s mental torment (1 Sam. 16.14–23). David was believed to be the author of 73 of the Psalms, and thus a consummate poet (in addition to being one of the most successful kings of ancient Israel). 10

I.e., wise words uttered at the right time (literally, at a time with which they are harmonious) are like calming music. 11 stiffe: stubborn.

271

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Such as that prudent Romane1 well invented, What time his people into partes did rive, Them reconcyld againe, and to their homes did drive. 3

Such us’d wise Glauce to that wrathfull knight,2 To calme the tempest of his troubled thought: Yet Blandamour with termes of foule despight, And Paridell her scornd, and set at nought, As old and crooked and not good for ought. Both they unwise, and warelesse3 of the evill, That by themselves unto themselves is wrought, Through that false witch, and that foule aged drevill,4 The one a feend, the other an incarnate devill.

4

With whom as they thus rode accompanide, They were encountred of 5 a lustie Knight, That had a goodly Ladie by his side, To whom he made great dalliance and delight. It was to weete the bold Sir Ferraugh 6 hight, He that from Braggadocchio whilome reft The snowy Florimell,7 whose beautie bright Made him seeme happie for so glorious theft; Yet was it in due triall but a wandring weft.8

1

prudent Romane: Menenius Agrippa, whose use of a particularly apt allegorical tale quieted a Roman mob. In the Renaissance, he was held up as the epitome of a wise and skillful orator. 2 that wrathfull knight: Scudamour. Given Glauce’s depiction thus far in Books Three and Four as a kindly but largely ineffectual old woman, the discovery that the preceding three examples of consummate poetic artistry are all similes for Glauce is startling. Indeed, literary critics of this passage have tended to discuss Orpheus, David, and Menenius Agrippa in their relation to the poet without ever mentioning Glauce. In a sense, the passage sublimates the rage of old women who are called “old and crooked and not good for ought” into a fantasy in which an old woman at least temporarily assumes the power of a great poet

of the ancient world. Male poets of Spenser’s day could not, of course, presume upon their own power, so the fantasy is Spenser’s to share. 3 warelesse: unaware; unwary. 4 false witch: Duessa; aged drevill: Ate; a “drevill” is a drudge, one who works at dirty and menial jobs. 5 of: by. 6 Ferraugh: Ferrau is a knight who pursues the heroine Angelica in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1.14–21). Spenser may also be thinking of “Ferragh,” an Irish battle cry. 7 At III.viii.15–19, where he was not given a name. 8 weft: waif; stray animal; unclaimed property—with the suggestion that it has little value to make anyone claim it.

Canto Two

5

Which when as Blandamour, whose fancie light Was alwaies flitting as the wavering wind, After each beautie, that appeard in sight, Beheld, eftsoones it prickt his wanton mind With sting of lust, that reasons eye did blind, That to Sir Paridell these words he sent; “Sir knight why ride ye dumpish1 thus behind, Since so good fortune doth to you present So fayre a spoyle, to make you joyous meriment?”

6

But Paridell that had too late a tryall Of the bad issue of his counsell vaine, List not to hearke, but made this faire denyall; “Last turne was mine, well proved to my paine, This now be yours, God send you better gaine.” Whose scoffed words he2 taking halfe in scorne, Fiercely forth prickt his steed as in disdaine, Against that Knight, ere he him well could torne; By meanes whereof he hath him lightly overborne.

7

Who with the sudden stroke astonisht sore, Upon the ground a while in slomber3 lay; The whiles his love away the other bore, And shewing her, did Paridell upbray;4 “Lo sluggish Knight the victors happie pray: So fortune friends the bold:” whom Paridell Seeing so faire indeede, as he did say, His hart with secret envie gan to swell, And inly grudge at him, that he had sped5 so well.

8

Nathlesse proud man himselfe the other deemed, Having so peerelesse paragon6 ygot: For sure the fayrest Florimell him seemed,7 To him was fallen for his happie lot, Whose like alive on earth he weened not: Therefore he her did court, did serve, did wooe,

1

dumpish: slow-witted; spiritless. scoffed: scoffing; he: Blandamour. 3 in slomber: unconscious. 4 upbray: upbraid. 2

5

273

sped: succeeded. paragon: companion; model of excellence. 7 him seemed: as it seemed to him. 6

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With humblest suit that he imagine mot,1 And all things did devise, and all things dooe, That might her love prepare, and liking win theretoo. 9

She in regard thereof him recompenst With golden words, and goodly countenance, And such fond favours sparingly dispenst: Sometimes him blessing with a light eye-glance, And coy lookes tempring with loose dalliance; Sometimes estranging him in sterner wise, That having cast him in a foolish trance, He seemed brought to bed in Paradise, And prov’d himselfe most foole, in what he seem’d most wise.

10

So great a mistresse of her art she was, And perfectly practiz’d in womans craft, That though therein himselfe he thought to pas,2 And by his false allurements wylie draft,3 Had thousand women of their love beraft,4 Yet now he was surpriz’d: for that false spright,5 Which that same witch had in this forme engraft, Was so expert in every subtile slight, That it could overreach the wisest earthly wight.

11

Yet he to her did dayly service more, And dayly more deceived was thereby; Yet Paridell him envied therefore, As seeming plast in sole felicity: So blind is lust, false colours to descry. But Ate soone discovering his6 desire, And finding now fit opportunity To stirre up strife, twixt love and spight and ire, Did privily put coles unto his secret fire.

12

By sundry meanes thereto she prickt him forth, Now with remembrance of those spightfull speaches, Now with opinion of his owne more worth,

1

mot: might. pas: surpass. 3 draft: attraction; power to draw astray; power of persuading a reluctant person. 2

4

beraft: bereft. See III.viii.7–9 for the implanting of a false spright in the False Florimell. 6 his: Paridell’s. 5

Canto Two

275

Now with recounting of like former breaches Made in their friendship, as that Hag him teaches: And ever when his passion is allayd, She it revives and new occasion reaches:1 That on a time as they together way’d,2 He made him open chalenge, and thus boldly sayd. 13

“Too boastfull Blandamour, too long I beare The open wrongs, thou doest me day by day; Well know’st thou, when we friendship first did sweare, The covenant was, that every spoyle or pray Should equally be shard betwixt us tway:3 Where is my part then of this Ladie bright, Whom to thy selfe thou takest quite away? Render therefore therein to me my right, Or answere for thy wrong, as shall fall out in fight.”

14

Exceeding wroth thereat was Blandamour, And gan this bitter answere to him make; “Too foolish Paridell, that fayrest floure Wouldst gather faine, and yet no paines wouldst take: But not so easie will I her forsake; This hand her wonne, this hand shall her defend.” With that they gan their shivering speares to shake, And deadly points at eithers breast to bend, Forgetfull each to have bene ever others frend.

15

Their firie Steedes with so untamed forse Did beare them both to fell avenges end,4 That both their speares with pitilesse remorse,5 Through shield and mayle, and haberjeon did wend, And in their flesh a griesly passage rend, That with the furie of their owne affret,6 Each other horse and man to ground did send; Where lying still a while, both did forget The perilous present stownd, in which their lives were set.

1

reaches: gives. way’d: went on their way. 3 tway: two. 2

4

to fell avenges end: to the goal of cruel revenge. 5 remorse: cutting force. 6 affret: attack (a Spenserian neologism).

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16

As when two warlike Brigandines at sea, With murdrous weapons arm’d to cruell fight, Doe meete together on the watry lea,1 They stemme2 ech other with so fell despight, That with the shocke of their owne heedlesse might, Their wooden ribs are shaken nigh a sonder; They which from shore behold the dreadfull sight Of flashing fire, and heare the ordenance thonder, Do greatly stand amaz’d at such unwonted wonder.

17

At length they both upstarted in amaze; As men awaked rashly out of dreme,3 And round about themselves a while did gaze, Till seeing her, that Florimell did seme, In doubt to whom she victorie should deeme,4 Therewith their dulled sprights they edgd5 anew, And drawing both their swords with rage extreme, Like two mad mastiffes each on other flew, And shields did share, and mailes did rash, and helmes did hew.6

18

So furiously each other did assayle, As if their soules they would attonce have rent Out of their brests, that streames of bloud did rayle7 Adowne, as if their springs of life were spent; That all the ground with purple bloud was sprent,8 And all their armours staynd with bloudie gore, Yet scarcely once to breath9 would they relent, So mortall was their malice and so sore, Become of fayned friendship which they vow’d afore.

1

lea: meadow (here Spenser’s metaphor for the sea). 2 stemme: ram. 3 Spenser is fascinated with dreamlike states and with stupefaction; they are topics worth investigating in his poetry. 4 The lady must decide who has won, so she will know to whom she now belongs.

5

edgd: sharpened (by the sight of her). share: cut into parts; rash: slash; smash. The three parallel clauses of this line mirror the confusion of the quick action. 7 rayle: gush. 8 sprent: sprinkled. 9 to breath: to take a breather. 6

Canto Two

19

And that which is for Ladies most besitting,1 To stint2 all strife, and foster friendly peace, Was from those Dames so farre and so unfitting,3 As that in stead of praying them surcease,4 They did much more their cruelty encrease; Bidding them fight for honour of their love, And rather die then Ladies cause release.5 With which vaine termes so much they did them move, That both resolv’d the last extremities to prove.6

20

There they I weene would fight untill this day, Had not a Squire, even he the Squire of Dames,7 By great adventure travelled that way; Who seeing both bent to so bloudy games, And both of old well knowing by their names, Drew nigh, to weete the cause of their debate: And first laide on those Ladies thousand blames,8 That did not seeke t’appease their deadly hate, But gazed on their harmes, not pittying their estate.

21

And then those Knights he humbly did beseech, To stay9 their hands, till he a while had spoken: Who lookt a little up at that his speech, Yet would not let their battell so be broken, Both greedie fiers on other to be wroken.10 Yet he to them so earnestly did call, And them conjur’d by some well knowen token,11 That they at last their wrothfull hands let fall, Content to heare him speake, and glad to rest withall.

1

besitting: befitting. stint: put a stop to. 3 unfitting: foreign to their natures. 4 surcease: stop. 5 release: give up, relinquish. 6 I.e., to fight to the death. 7 even he: none other than; Squire of Dames: first seen at III.vii.37; most recently seen at III.viii.52–ix.6. 2

8

277

The Squire of Dames seems to have learned how to be less than perfectly pleasing to all women. 9 stay: hold, keep still. 10 wroken: wreaked, avenged. 11 conjur’d: constrained by oath; entreated; used magic upon. We are not told what the token is.

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22

First he desir’d their cause of strife to see: They said, it was for love of Florimell. “Ah gentle knights” (quoth he) “how may that bee, And she so farre astray, as none can tell.” “Fond Squire,” full angry then sayd Paridell, “Seest not the Ladie there before thy face?” He looked backe, and her advizing well, Weend as he said, by that her outward grace, That fayrest Florimell was present there in place.

23

Glad man was he to see that joyous sight, For none alive but joy’d in Florimell,1 And lowly to her lowting2 thus behight; “Fayrest of faire, that fairenesse doest excell, This happie day I have to greete you well, In which you safe I see, whom thousand late Misdoubted3 lost through mischiefe that befell; Long may you live in health and happie state.” She litle answer’d him, but lightly did aggrate.4

24

Then turning to those Knights, he gan a new; “And you Sir Blandamour and Paridell, That for this Ladie present in your vew, Have rays’d this cruell warre and outrage fell, Certes me seemes bene not advised well, But rather ought in friendship for her sake To joyne your force, their forces to repell, That seeke perforce her from you both to take, And of your gotten spoyle their owne triumph to make.”

25

Thereat Sir Blandamour with countenance sterne, All full of wrath, thus fiercely him bespake; “A read thou Squire, that I the man may learne, That5 dare fro me thinke Florimell to take.”

1 Florimell: i.e., the False Florimell, also known as the Snowy Florimell. From here on, Spenser often simply uses “Florimell” to designate the False Florimell, when the context tells us who is meant. If the practice occasionally confuses us, we are experiencing only a small part of the confusion experienced by characters in the poem.

2

lowting: bowing. Misdoubted: feared. 4 lightly did aggrate: carelessly thanked him. 5 That: who. 3

Canto Two

279

“Not one” (quoth he) “but many doe partake Herein, as thus. It lately so befell,1 That Satyran a girdle did uptake,2 Well knowne to appertaine to Florimell, Which for her sake he wore, as him beseemed well. 26

“But when as she her selfe was lost and gone, Full many knights, that loved her like deare, Thereat did greatly grudge, that he alone That lost faire Ladies ornament should weare, And gan therefore close3 spight to him to beare: Which he to shun, and stop vile envies sting, Hath lately caus’d to be proclaim’d each where A solemne feast, with publike turneying,4 To which all knights with them their Ladies are to bring.

27

“And of them all she that is fayrest found, Shall have that golden girdle for reward, And of those Knights who is most stout on ground, Shall to that fairest Ladie be prefard.5 Since therefore she her selfe6 is now your ward, To you that ornament of hers pertaines, Against all those, that chalenge it to gard, And save her honour with your ventrous7 paines; That shall you win more glory, then ye here find gaines.”

28

When they the reason of his words had hard, They gan abate the rancour of their rage, And with their honours and their loves regard,

1

befell: chanced, happened. After the real Florimell lost her sash while fleeing the hyena, Satyrane found it and used it to tie up the hyena (III.vii.31, 36). The hyena dragged it back to the witch (III.viii.2). Hamilton speculates that Satyrane must be wearing not the original sash, but its eidolon––its demonic shadow––just as the False Florimell is the demonic shadow of Florimell. Yet this sash refuses to let itself be worn by the False Florimell, justly indicating her lack of virtue and Amoret’s virtue (see v.2–6, 16–20; iv.15 indicates that 2

it is the same girdle), so perhaps its reappearance is one of Spenser’s inconsistencies rather than consciously arranged on his part. 3 close: secret, disguised. 4 turneying: jousting in a tournament. 5 I.e., will be recommended to the lady who has been judged most beautiful (with the idea that the two of them will become a couple). 6 she her selfe: the False Florimell. 7 ventrous: adventurous, willing to risk hazards.

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The furious flames of malice to asswage. Tho each to other did his faith engage, Like faithfull friends thenceforth to joyne in one With all their force, and battell strong to wage Gainst all those knights, as their professed fone, That chaleng’d ought in Florimell, save they alone.1 29

So well accorded forth they rode together In friendly sort, that lasted but a while; And of all old dislikes they made faire weather,2 Yet all was forg’d and spred with golden foyle, That under it hidde hate and hollow guyle. Ne certes can that friendship long endure, How ever gay and goodly be the style,3 That doth ill cause or evill end enure:4 For vertue is the band, that bindeth harts most sure.

30

Thus as they marched all in close disguise, Of fayned love, they chaunst to overtake Two knights, that lincked rode in lovely5 wise, As if they secret counsels did partake; And each not farre behinde him had his make,6 To weete, two Ladies of most goodly hew, That twixt themselves did gentle purpose7 make, Unmindfull both of that discordfull crew, The which with speedie pace did after them pursew.

31

Who as they now approched nigh at hand, Deeming them doughtie as they did appeare, They sent that Squire afore, to understand, What mote they be: who viewing them more neare Returned readie newes, that those same weare Two of the prowest8 Knights in Faery lond;

1

I.e., against all knights who fought to gain Florimell, except for the two of them. 2 I.e., they now made light of—or smoothed over—all of their previous enmity toward each other. 3 style: manner.

4

enure: enact, bring about. lovely: loving. 6 make: mate. 7 purpose: conversation. 8 prowest: most worthy, most valiant. 5

Canto Two

281

And those two Ladies their two lovers deare, Couragious Cambell, and stout Triamond, With Canacee and Cambine1 linckt in lovely bond. 32

Whylome as antique stories tellen us,2 Those two were foes the fellonest3 on ground, And battell made the dreddest daungerous, That ever shrilling trumpet did resound; Though now their acts be no where to be found, As that renowmed Poet them compyled, With warlike numbers4 and Heroicke sound, Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled,5 On Fames eternall beadroll6 worthie to be fyled.

33

But wicked Time that all good thoughts doth waste, And workes of noblest wits to nought out weare, That famous moniment hath quite defaste, And robd the world of threasure endlesse deare, The which mote have enriched all us heare.7

1

Cambell: see note to Book Four title; Triamond: the name means “third world”; also see note to Book Four title; Canacee: the name of Cambalo’s sister in Chaucer’s Squire’s Tale; Cambine: from the Italian cambiare, meaning “to exchange” or “to change,” or from the English “combine.” 2 The “antique stories” are one story, Chaucer’s Squire’s Tale, which Chaucer never completed. Spenser takes up Chaucer’s tale to finish it. Chaucer’s own sources included Ovid’s Heroides 11. 3 Those two: Cambell and Triamond; fellonest: fiercest. 4 numbers: poetic meter. 5 Dan: courtesy title for a male member of a religious order or for a male scholar, knight, poet, or deity; Spenser uses the title only for deities, except when applying it to Chaucer; English undefyled: Spenser imitated many of Chaucer’s medieval spellings and usages, at least partly from the belief that Chaucer’s English was more pure and less corrupted by French and Italian additions than that of the late sixteenth century.

It is instructive to compare Spenser’s remarks throughout A View of the Present State of Ireland about the ways that English settlers in Ireland allowed themselves to be corrupted by the acquisition of Irish manners and speech. 6 beadroll: catalogue; list of persons to be prayed for. 7 Spenser believes that Chaucer wrote an ending to The Squire’s Tale that was then lost sometime before the sixteenth century, rather than that he never finished it in the first place (quite possibly because he wanted to imply that the other pilgrims couldn’t bear to listen to any more of the Squire’s prolixity). It is useful to compare Spenser’s encomium to Chaucer with the earlier description of Ate’s museum of relics (i.21–26; see also i.21.2.n. and i.30.6.n.). Taken together, the two passages imply that great poetry such as Chaucer’s is a “moniment” to the past and a crucial repository of human knowledge, the loss of which is both the result and the cause of much human discord. Our unwariness toward Ate––whose treason and falsehood “mote

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O cursed Eld the cankerworme of writs,1 How may these rimes, so rude as doth appeare, Hope to endure, sith workes of heavenly wits Are quite devourd, and brought to nought by little bits? 34

Then pardon, O most sacred happie spirit,2 That I thy labours lost may thus revive, And steale from thee the meede of thy due merit, That none durst ever whilest thou wast alive, And being dead in vaine yet many strive:3 Ne dare I like,4 but through infusion sweete Of thine owne spirit, which doth in me survive, I follow here the footing of thy feete,5 That with thy meaning so I may the rather meete.6

35

Cambelloes sister was fayre Canacee, That was the learnedst Ladie in her dayes, Well seene in everie science that mote bee,7 And every secret worke of natures wayes, In wittie riddles, and in wise soothsayes, In power of herbes, and tunes of beasts and burds; And, that8 augmented all her other prayse, She modest was in all her deedes and words, And wondrous chast of life, yet lov’d of Knights and Lords.9

to none but to the warie wise appeare” (i.17.9)––proceeds from our having obliterated not only our political history, but also our literary history. This entire discussion is a redevelopment and extension of the ideas broached in the descriptions of Time and immortality in the Garden of Adonis (III.vi). 1 Eld: age; writs: writings. 2 happie: blessed; Spenser addresses the spirit of Chaucer. 3 I.e., and you being dead, many still strive in vain. 4 Ne dare I like: nor would I dare to do the same (as those who have already vainly tried to imitate you). 5 feete: with a pun on the metrical feet of poetry.

6

That: in order that; meete: agree; find. I.e., well taught in every possible branch of learning. 8 that: something which. 9 With this stanza, Spenser picks up where The Squire’s Tale leaves off. In that tale, King Cambuscan of Tartary receives gifts from the King of Arabia, including a magic ring that enables Cambuscan’s daughter, Canacee, to understand the language of birds. A bleeding female falcon tells Canacee about having been wooed by a male falcon who then abandoned her to her self-mutilating grief. Full of sympathy, Canacee nurses the female falcon back to health. The Squire who is narrating promises to describe how the falcon regained her mate and how Cambalo fought with two 7

Canto Two

36

Full many Lords, and many Knights her loved, Yet she to none of them her liking lent, Ne ever was with fond affection moved, But rul’d her thoughts with goodly governement,1 For dread of blame and honours blemishment; And eke unto her lookes a law she made, That none of them once out of order went, But like to warie Centonels well stayd, Still watcht on every side, of secret foes affrayd.2

37

So much the more as she refusd to love, So much the more she loved was and sought, That oftentimes unquiet strife did move Amongst her lovers, and great quarrels wrought, That oft for her in bloudie armes they fought. Which whenas Cambell, that was stout and wise, Perceiv’d would breede great mischiefe, he bethought How to prevent the perill that mote rise, And turne both him and her to honour in this wise.

38

One day, when all that troupe of warlike wooers Assembled were, to weet whose she should bee, All mightie men and dreadfull derring dooers,3 (The harder it to make them well agree) Amongst them all this end4 he did decree; That of them all, which love to her did make,5 They by consent should chose the stoutest three, That with himselfe should combat for her sake, And of them all the victour should his sister take.6

brothers for Canacee in order to win her— but there the tale breaks off. 1 Elizabethans generally considered good rule, rather than democracy or individual freedoms, to be the primary source of civic concord. Good rule included that of God over humanity, of a monarch over the nation, of men over women, and of each person over his or her unruly impulses. 2 I.e., she guarded her glances, making sure not to let them stray flirtatiously. She is the chaste opposite of Malecasta, whose “wanton eyes, ill signes of womanhed, / Did roll

283

too highly, and too often glaunce, / Without regard of grace, or comely amenaunce” (III.i.41.7–9). 3 dreadfull derring dooers: awe-inspiring in their commission of daring deeds. 4 end: goal. 5 Making love was wooing a woman, not necessarily having sex with her; the term did not have unchaste overtones. 6 Whereas Chaucer follows his sources in having Cambalo fight to win Canacee for himself—thus implying that the brother and sister have an incestuous love for each

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39

Bold was the chalenge, as himselfe was bold, And courage full of haughtie hardiment,1 Approved oft in perils manifold, Which he atchiev’d to his great ornament:2 But yet his sisters skill unto him lent Most confidence and hope of happie speed,3 Conceived by a ring, which she him sent, That mongst the manie vertues, which we reed, Had power to staunch4 al wounds, that mortally did bleed.

40

Well was that rings great vertue knowen to all, That dread thereof, and his5 redoubted might Did all that youthly rout so much appall,6 That none of them durst undertake the fight; More wise they weend to make of love delight, Then life to hazard for faire Ladies looke, And yet uncertaine by such outward sight, Though for her sake they all that perill tooke, Whether she would them love, or in her liking brooke.7

41

Amongst those knights there were three brethren bold, Three bolder brethren never were yborne, Borne of one mother in one happie mold, Borne at one burden8 in one happie morne, Thrise happie mother, and thrise happie morne, That bore three such, three such not to be fond;9 Her name was Agape whose children werne All three as one, the first hight Priamond, The second Dyamond, the youngest Triamond.10

other—Spenser has Cambello fight to choose the most valiant opponent to wed Canacee, thus emphasizing the brother and sister’s chaste friendship. 1 hardiment: hardihood. 2 ornament: good reputation, credit. 3 speed: success. 4 staunch: stanch, stop the flow of blood from. 5 his: Cambello’s.

6

appall: intimidate. I.e., they were wary of risking their lives for a fair lady, given that they couldn’t tell simply by looking at her whether she would love the victor or be constant in her preference. 8 burden: that which is borne in the womb, a child—or in this case, triplets. 9 fond: found. 10 I.e., first, second, and third world (Latin). 7

Canto Two

42

Stout Priamond, but not so strong to strike, Strong Diamond, but not so stout a knight, But Triamond was stout and strong alike: On horsebacke used Triamond to fight, And Priamond on foote had more delight, But horse and foote knew Diamond to wield: With curtaxe1 used Diamond to smite, And Triamond to handle speare and shield, But speare and curtaxe both usd Priamond in field.

43

These three did love each other dearely well, And with so firme affection were allyde, As if but one soule in them all did dwell, Which did her powre into three parts divyde; Like three faire branches budding farre and wide, That from one roote deriv’d their vitall sap: And like that roote that doth her life divide, Their mother was, and had full blessed hap, These three so noble babes to bring forth at one clap.2

44

Their mother was a Fay, and had the skill3 Of secret things, and all the powres of nature, Which she by art could use unto her will, And to her service bind each living creature, Through secret understanding of their feature.4 Thereto she was right faire, when so her face She list discover, and of goodly stature; But she as Fayes are wont, in privie place Did spend her dayes, and lov’d in forests wyld to space.

45

There on a day a noble youthly knight Seeking adventures in the salvage wood, Did by great fortune get of her the sight; As she sate carelesse by a cristall flood,5

1

curtaxe: a short battle-ax. Note the triplets in the verse form and in the repeated naming of the brothers. Cf. the tripled description of Reproch, Repentaunce, and Shame at III.xii.24. 2 at one clap: in one event, at once.

3

285

Fay: fairy—not a diminutive being, but a supernatural creature, outwardly resembling a human being, living in a world that overlaps that of mortals; skill: knowledge. 4 feature: nature; form. 5 carelesse: free of care; unwary; flood: stream or river.

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Combing her golden lockes, as seemd her good: And unawares upon her laying hold, That strove in vaine him long to have withstood, Oppressed1 her, and there (as it is told) Got2 these three lovely babes, that prov’d three champions bold. 46

Which she with her long fostred in that wood, Till that to ripenesse of mans state they grew: Then shewing forth signes of their fathers blood, They loved armes, and knighthood did ensew,3 Seeking adventures, where they anie knew. Which when their mother saw, she gan to dout Their safetie, least by searching daungers new, And rash provoking perils all about, Their days mote be abridged through their corage stout.

47

Therefore desirous th’end of all their dayes To know, and them t’enlarge with long extent,4 By wondrous skill, and many hidden wayes, To the three fatall sisters5 house she went. Farre under ground from tract of living went,6 Downe in the bottome of the deepe Abysse,7 Where Demogorgon8 in dull darknesse pent, Farre from the view of Gods and heavens blis, The hideous Chaos keepes,9 their dreadfull dwelling is.

48

There she them found, all sitting round about The direfull distaffe10 standing in the mid, And with unwearied fingers drawing out

1

Oppressed: raped. Got: begot. 3 ensew: pursue. 4 I.e., wanting to know how they will die and wanting to lengthen their lives greatly. 5 three fatall sisters: the three Fates— Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos—who at each baby’s birth determine the events in that child’s life by spinning out a length of thread and then determine the length of the child’s life by cutting the thread. In Greek mythology, not even the gods could change what the Fates decreed. 2

6

tract: track, path; went: creature. Abysse: bowels of the earth; infernal pit. 8 Demogorgon: a god of the underworld. 9 As Fowler points out, either Demogorgon, pent in darkness, keeps Chaos, or Chaos keeps Demogorgon pent in darkness (Fowler 1989, 46). 10 distaffe: a cleft staff that holds flax, wool, or tow so that it can be drawn out and spun into thread by hand. 7

Canto Two

287

The lines of life, from living knowledge hid. Sad Clotho held the rocke, the whiles the thrid1 By griesly Lachesis was spun with paine,2 That cruell Atropos eftsoones undid, With cursed knife cutting the twist3 in twaine: Most wretched men, whose dayes depend on thrids so vaine. 49

She them saluting, there by them sate still, Beholding how the thrids of life they span:4 And when at last she had beheld her fill, Trembling in heart, and looking pale and wan, Her cause of comming she to tell began. To whom fierce Atropos, “Bold Fay, that durst5 Come see the secret of the life of man, Well worthie thou to be of Jove accurst, And eke thy childrens thrids to be a sunder burst.”

50

Whereat she sore affrayd,6 yet her besought To graunt her boone,7 and rigour to abate, That she might see her childrens thrids forth brought, And know the measure of their utmost date,8 To them ordained by eternall fate. Which Clotho graunting, shewed her the same: That when she saw, it did her much amate,9 To see their thrids so thin, as spiders frame,10 And eke so short, that seemd their ends out shortly came.

51

She then began them humbly to intreate, To draw them longer out, and better twine, That so their lives might be prolonged late. But Lachesis thereat gan to repine, And sayd, “Fond dame that deem’st of things divine As of humane, that they may altred bee,

1

Sad: solemn; rocke: distaff; thrid: thread. 2 paine: care. 3 twist: fiber twisted into thread. 4 span: spun. 5 Bold: the word is not a compliment here; when applied to a woman, it usually means

“presumptuous” or “immodest”; durst: dares. 6 affrayd: feared. 7 boone: entreaty. 8 I.e., know the time remaining until their deaths. 9 amate: dismay. 10 frame: construction (i.e., a web).

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And chaung’d at pleasure for those impes1 of thine. Not so; for what the Fates do once decree, Not all the gods can chaunge, nor Jove him self can free.” 52

“Then since” (quoth she) “the terme of each mans life For nought may lessened nor enlarged bee, Graunt this, that when ye shred with fatall knife His line, which is the eldest of the three, Which is of them the shortest, as I see, Eftsoones his life may passe into the next; And when the next shall likewise ended bee, That both their lives may likewise be annext Unto the third, that his may so be trebly wext.”2

53

They graunted it; and then that carefull3 Fay Departed thence with full contented mynd; And comming home, in warlike fresh aray Them found all three according to their kynd:4 But unto them what destinie was assynd, Or how their lives were eekt,5 she did not tell; But evermore, when she fit time could fynd, She warned them to tend their safeties well, And love each other deare, what ever them befell.

54

So did they surely during all their dayes, And never discord did amongst them fall; Which much augmented all their other praise. And now t’increase affection naturall, In love of Canacee they joyned all:6 Upon which ground this same great battell grew, Great matter growing of beginning small; The which for length I will not here pursew, But rather will reserve it for a Canto new.

1

3

2

4

impes: children. wext: grown, increased. Spenser may be thinking of Feronia, in the Aeneid, who gives her son, Erulus, three lives so that he must be killed three times in order to die permanently (Aeneid, 8.563–67).

carefull: burdened with cares. I.e., each provided with weapons and gear befitting his talents (see 42.7–9). 5 eekt: eked out, lengthened. 6 They can love the same woman without destroying their love for each other.

Canto Three The battell twixt three brethren with Cambell for Canacee: Cambina with true friendships bond doth their long strife agree.1

1

O why doe wretched men so much desire, To draw their dayes unto the utmost date,2 And doe not rather wish them soone expire, Knowing the miserie of their estate,3 And thousand perills which them still awate, Tossing them like a boate amid the mayne, That every houre they knocke at deathes gate?4 And he that happie seemes and least in payne, Yet is as nigh his end, as he that most doth playne.

2

Therefore this Fay I hold but fond and vaine, The which in seeking for her children three Long life, thereby did more prolong their paine. Yet whilest they lived none did ever see More happie creatures, then they seem’d to bee, Nor more ennobled for their courtesie, That made them dearely lov’d of each degree;5 Ne more renowmed for their chevalrie, That made them dreaded much of all men farre and nie.

3

These three that hardie chalenge tooke in hand, For Canacee with Cambell for to fight: The day was set, that all might understand, And pledges pawnd the same to keepe a right,6 That day, the dreddest day that living wight

1

agree: bring to agreement; settle. I.e., to extend their lives as long as possible. 3 estate: situation (as human beings). 4 Cf. Despaire’s question at I.ix.46.1–2, 47.7–8. 2

5

of each degree: by people of every social level. 6 I.e., they threw gloves or other tokens on the ground as symbolic promises that they would engage in battle; these pledges were called “gages” and were regarded as challenges to the opponent.

289

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Did ever see upon this world to shine, So soone as heavens window shewed light, These warlike Champions all in armour shine,1 Assembled were in field, the chalenge to define.2 4

The field with listes3 was all about enclos’d, To barre the prease4 of people farre away; And at th’one side sixe judges were dispos’d,5 To view and deeme the deedes of armes that day; And on the other side in fresh aray, Fayre Canacee upon a stately stage Was set, to see the fortune of that fray, And to be seene, as his most worthie wage,6 That could her purchase with his lives adventur’d gage.7

5

Then entred Cambell first into the list,8 With stately steps, and fearelesse countenance, As if the conquest his he surely wist. Soone after did the brethren three advance, In brave aray and goodly amenance,9 With scutchins gilt10 and banners broad displayd: And marching thrise in warlike ordinance, Thrise lowted11 lowly to the noble Mayd, The whiles shril trompets and loud clarions12 sweetly playd.

6

Which doen the doughty chalenger came forth, All arm’d to point his chalenge to abet:13 Gainst whom Sir Priamond with equall worth, And equall armes himselfe did forward set. A trompet blew; they both together met, With dreadfull force, and furious intent,

1

shine: shining. define: decide. 3 listes: railings or fences placed about a field to be used for a tournament or for duels. 4 prease: press, crowd. 5 dispos’d: arranged, situated. 6 wage: prize. 2

7

gage: see stanza 3.4.n. above. Cambello is offering his own life as a gage. 8 into the list: into the enclosure. 9 amenance: noble bearing. 10 gilt: gilded with gold leaf or gold paint. 11 lowted: bowed. 12 clarions: trumpets with narrow tubes, used in war and in tournaments. 13 to point: thoroughly; abet: maintain.

Canto Three

291

Carelesse of perill in their fiers affret,1 As if that life to losse they had forelent,2 And cared not to spare, that should be shortly spent. 7

Right practicke3 was Sir Priamond in fight, And throughly skild in use of shield and speare; Ne lesse approved was Cambelloes might, Ne lesse his skill in weapons did appeare, That hard it was to weene which harder4 were. Full many mightie strokes on either side Were sent, that seemed death in them to beare, But they were both so watchfull and well eyde, That they avoyded were, and vainely by did slyde.

8

Yet one of many was so strongly bent By Priamond, that with unluckie glaunce Through Cambels shoulder it unwarely5 went, That forced him his shield to disadvaunce:6 Much was he grieved with that gracelesse7 chaunce, Yet from the wound no drop of bloud there fell, But wondrous paine, that did the more enhaunce His haughtie courage to advengement8 fell: Smart daunts not mighty harts, but makes them more to swell.

9

With that his poynant speare he fierce aventred,9 With doubled force close underneath his shield, That through the mayles into his10 thigh it entred, And there arresting, readie way did yield, For bloud to gush forth on the grassie field; That he for paine himselfe n’ote11 right upreare,

1

7

2

8

affret: attack. forelent: given up in advance. 3 practicke: practiced, skilled. 4 harder: hardier. 5 unwarely: unexpectedly, because he was unwary. 6 disadvaunce: draw back; lower.

gracelesse: unfortunate. advengement: revenge. 9 poynant: piercing (literally poignant); aventred: set in its rest, in preparation for striking (or, given the next line, perhaps “thrust”). 10 his: Priamond’s. 11 n’ote: ne wote, knew not how to.

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But too and fro in great amazement reel’d, Like an old Oke whose pith and sap is seare,1 At puffe of every storme doth stagger2 here and theare. 10

Whom so dismayd when Cambell had espide, Againe he drove at him with double might, That nought mote stay the steele, till in his side The mortall point most cruelly empight:3 Where fast infixed, whilest he sought by slight It forth to wrest, the staffe a sunder brake, And left the head behind: with which despight He all enrag’d, his shivering speare did shake, And charging him a fresh thus felly him bespake.

11

“Lo faitour4 there thy meede unto thee take, The meede of thy mischalenge and abet:5 Not for thine owne, but for thy sisters sake, Have I thus long thy life unto thee let: But to forbeare doth not forgive the det.” The wicked weapon heard his wrathfull vow, And passing forth with furious affret, Pierst through his bever6 quite into his brow, That with the force it backward forced him to bow.

12

Therewith a sunder in the midst it brast, And in his hand nought but the troncheon7 left, The other halfe behind yet sticking fast, Out of his headpeece Cambell fiercely reft,8 And with such furie backe at him it heft,9 That making way unto his dearest life, His weasand pipe it through his gorget10 cleft: Thence streames of purple bloud issuing rife, Let forth his wearie ghost and made an end of strife.

1

seare: dried up. stagger: sway unsteadily. 3 empight: planted itself. 4 faitour: villain. 5 I.e., the reward for your pursuing a wrongful challenge. Priamond’s words seem unnecessarily angry, given that he and Cambello both entered the lists voluntarily 2

over a formal challenge, rather than in the field of battle. 6 bever: helmet visor. 7 troncheon: the spear fragment still in Priamond’s hand. 8 reft: ripped. 9 heft: heaved. 10 weasand pipe: windpipe; gorget: armor over the throat.

Canto Three

13

His wearie ghost assoyld from fleshly band,1 Did not as others wont, directly fly Unto her rest in Plutoes griesly land,2 Ne into ayre did vanish presently,3 Ne chaunged was into a starre in sky: But through traduction was eftsoones derived,4 Like as his mother prayd the Destinie, Into his other brethren, that survived, In whom he liv’d a new, of former life deprived.

14

Whom when on ground his brother next beheld, Though sad and sorie for so heavy sight, Yet leave5 unto his sorrow did not yeeld, But rather stird to vengeance and despight, Through secret feeling of his generous spright, Rusht fiercely forth, the battell to renew, As in reversion6 of his brothers right; And chalenging the Virgin as his dew.7 His foe was soone addrest: the trompets freshly blew.

15

With that they both together fiercely met, As if that each ment other to devoure; And with their axes both so sorely bet,8 That neither plate nor mayle,9 whereas their powre They felt, could once sustaine the hideous stowre, But rived were like rotten wood a sunder, Whilest through their rifts the ruddie bloud did showre And fire did flash, like lightning after thunder, That fild the lookers on attonce with ruth and wonder.10

1

assoyld: set free; acquitted; absolved; band: bond. 2 I.e., it did not go directly to hell. 3 presently: immediately. 4 traduction: transmission or transmigration of the soul; derived: transferred. 5 leave: permission for it to express itself. 6 reversion: a legal term designating someone’s right to take over an office after the previous officeholder has died.

7

293

dew: due. bet: beat. 9 mayle: chain mail. 10 ruth and wonder: as Hamilton points out in his note, these are the emotions traditionally thought to be aroused by viewing a tragic play. 8

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16

As when two Tygers prickt with hungers rage, Have by good fortune found some beasts fresh spoyle, On which they weene their famine to asswage, And gaine a feastfull guerdon1of their toyle, Both falling out doe stirre up strifefull broyle, And cruell battell twixt themselves doe make, Whiles neither lets the other touch the soyle,2 But either sdeignes with other to partake:3 So cruelly these Knights strove for that Ladies sake.

17

Full many strokes, that mortally were ment, The whiles were enterchaunged twixt them two; Yet they were all with so good wariment4 Or warded, or avoyded and let goe, That still the life stood fearelesse of her foe:5 Till Diamond disdeigning long delay Of doubtfull fortune wavering to and fro, Resolv’d to end it one or other way; And heav’d his murdrous axe at him with mighty sway.6

18

The dreadfull stroke in case7 it had arrived, Where it was ment, (so deadly it was ment) The soule had sure out of his bodie rived, And stinted all the strife incontinent.8 But Cambels fate that fortune did prevent:9 For seeing it at hand, he swarv’d asyde, And so gave way unto his fell intent: Who missing of the marke which he had eyde, Was with the force nigh feld whilst his right foot did slyde.

19

As when a Vulture greedie of his pray, Through hunger long, that hart to him doth lend, Strikes at an Heron with all his bodies sway, That from his force seemes nought may it defend;

1

guerdon: reward, recompense. the soyle: where the spoil lies. 3 I.e., each disdains to fight another, or each disdains to go after different prey. 4 wariment: wariness. 5 her foe: death. 2

6

sway: power, force. in case: if, in the event that. 8 I.e., immediately ceased all the strife, or ceased all the intemperate strife. 9 prevent: anticipate (literally come before). 7

Canto Three

295

The warie fowle that spies him toward bend His dreadfull souse, avoydes it shunning light,1 And maketh him his wing in vaine to spend; That with the weight of his owne weeldlesse2 might, He falleth nigh to ground, and scarse recovereth flight. 20

Which faire adventure3 when Cambello spide, Full lightly, ere himselfe he could recower,4 From daungers dread to ward his naked side,5 He can6 let drive at him with all his power, And with his axe him smote in evill hower, That from his shoulders quite his head he reft: The headlesse tronke, as heedlesse of that stower,7 Stood still a while, and his fast footing kept, Till feeling life to fayle, it fell, and deadly slept.

21

They which that piteous spectacle beheld, Were much amaz’d the headlesse tronke to see Stand up so long, and weapon vaine to weld,8 Unweeting of the Fates divine decree, For lifes succession in those brethren three. For notwithstanding that one soule was reft, Yet, had the bodie not dismembred bee, It would have lived, and revived eft;9 But finding no fit seat, the lifelesse corse it left.

22

It left; but that same soule,10 which therein dwelt, Streight entring into Triamond, him fild With double life, and griefe, which when he felt, As one whose inner parts had bene ythrild With point of steele, that close his hartbloud spild, He lightly lept out of his place of rest,

1

souse: swoop; light: nimbly. weeldlesse: unwieldy. 3 adventure: chance, opportunity. 4 recower: recover (OED “recour” v. trans.). 2

5 ward: guard; naked side: the right side, not covered by the shield.

6

can: gan, did. stower: commotion; stress. 8 weld: wield. 9 eft: afterwards; again. 10 It: Priamond’s soul, which had entered into Diamond; that same soule: Diamond’s own soul. 7

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And rushing forth into the emptie field, Against Cambello fiercely him addrest; Who him affronting soone to fight was readie prest.1 23

Well mote ye wonder how that noble Knight, After he had so often wounded beene, Could stand on foot, now to renew the fight. But had ye then him forth advauncing seene, Some newborne wight ye would him surely weene: So fresh he seemed and so fierce in sight; Like as a Snake, whom wearie winters teene, Hath worne to nought, now feeling sommers might, Casts off his ragged skin and freshly doth him dight.

24

All was through vertue of the ring he wore, The which not onely did not from him let One drop of bloud to fall, but did restore His weakned powers, and dulled spirits whet, Through working of the stone therein yset. Else how could one of equall might with most,2 Against so many no lesse mightie met, Once thinke to match three such on equall cost,3 Three such as able were to match a puissant host.

25

Yet nought thereof was Triamond adredde,4 Ne desperate5 of glorious victorie, But sharpely him assayld, and sore bestedde, With heapes of strokes, which he at him let flie, As thicke as hayle forth poured from the skie: He stroke, he soust, he foynd,6 he hewd, he lasht, And did his yron brond7 so fast applie, That from the same the fierie sparkles flasht, As fast as water-sprinkles gainst a rocke are dasht.

1

affronting: confronting; prest: prepared. I.e., of average might. 3 on equall cost: on even terms; on an even playing field (literally coast). 4 adredde: made to dread. 2

5

desperate: despairing. soust: swooped; pounced; foynd: thrust; lunged. 7 brond: brand, sword. 6

Canto Three

26

Much was Cambello daunted with his blowes: So thicke they fell, and forcibly were sent, That he was forst from daunger of the throwes1 Backe to retire, and somewhat to relent, Till th’heat of his fierce furie he had spent: Which when for want of breath gan to abate, He then afresh with new encouragement Did him assayle, and mightily amate, As fast as forward erst, now backward to retrate.

27

Like as the tide that comes fro th’Ocean mayne, Flowes up the Shenan2 with contrarie forse, And overruling him in his owne rayne,3 Drives backe the current of his kindly course, And makes it seeme to have some other sourse: But when the floud is spent, then backe againe His borrowed waters forst to redisbourse,4 He sends the sea his owne with double gaine, And tribute eke withall, as to his Soveraine.5

28

Thus did the battell varie to and fro, With diverse fortune doubtfull to be deemed: Now this the better had, now had his fo; Then he halfe vanquisht, then the other seemed, Yet victors both them selves alwayes esteemed. And all the while the disentrayled6 blood Adowne their sides like litle rivers stremed, That with the wasting of his vitall flood, Sir Triamond at last full faint and feeble stood.

29

But Cambell still more strong and greater grew, Ne felt his blood to wast, ne powres emperisht,7 Through that rings vertue, that with vigour new,

1

throwes: blows. the Shenan: the Sionainn (also known as Shannon), Ireland’s largest tidal river, about 30 miles north of Spenser’s Kilcolman Castle. As Clerk of the Council, Spenser would often have been in Limerick, which is right on the Sionainn. 3 rayne: realm. 2

4

297

redisbourse: repay (i.e., empty again out to sea). 5 tribute: tax paid to a lord or monarch. Note the pun on “tributary.” Cf. VI.Pr. 7.4–5, in which Spenser describes himself as a river receiving water from, and repaying water to, the Ocean, Queen Elizabeth. 6 disentrayled: produced from the entrails. 7 emperisht: enfeebled.

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298

Still when as he enfeebled was, him cherisht, And all his wounds, and all his bruses guarisht,1 Like as a withered tree through husbands2 toyle Is often seene full freshly to have florisht, And fruitfull apples to have borne awhile, As fresh as when it first was planted in the soyle. 30

Through which advantage, in his strength he rose, And smote the other with so wondrous might, That through the seame, which did his hauberk close, Into his throate and life it pierced quight, That downe he fell as dead in all mens sight: Yet dead he was not, yet he sure did die, As all men do, that lose the living spright: So did one soule out of his bodie flie Unto her native home from mortall miserie.

31

But nathelesse whilst all the lookers on Him dead behight,3 as he to all appeard, All unawares he started up anon, As one that had out of a dreame bene reard, And fresh assayld his foe, who halfe affeard Of th’uncouth sight, as he some ghost had seene, Stood still amaz’d, holding his idle sweard; Till having often by him stricken beene, He forced was to strike, and save him selfe from teene.

32

Yet from thenceforth more warily he fought, As one in feare the Stygian gods t’offend, Ne followd on so fast, but rather sought Him selfe to save, and daunger to defend,4 Then life and labour both in vaine to spend. Which Triamond perceiving, weened sure He gan to faint, toward the battels end, And that he should not long on foote endure, A signe which did to him the victorie assure.

1 2

guarisht: healed. husbands: farmer’s.

3 4

behight: considered. defend: defend against, fend off.

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33

Whereof full blith, eftsoones his mightie hand He heav’d on high, in mind with that same blow To make an end of all that did withstand: Which Cambell seeing come, was nothing slow Him selfe to save from that so deadly throw;1 And at that instant reaching forth his sweard Close underneath his shield, that scarce did show, Stroke him, as he his hand to strike upreard, In th’arm-pit full, that through both sides the wound appeard.

34

Yet still that direfull stroke kept on his way, And falling heavie on Cambelloes crest, Strooke him so hugely, that in swowne he lay, And in his head an hideous wound imprest:2 And sure had it not happily found rest Upon the brim of his brode plated shield, It would have cleft his braine downe to his brest. So both at once fell dead upon the field, And each to other seemd the victorie to yield.

35

Which when as all the lookers on beheld, They weened sure the warre was at an end, And Judges rose, and Marshals of the field Broke up the listes, their armes away to rend; And Canacee gan wayle her dearest frend. All suddenly they both upstarted light, The one out of the swownd, which him did blend,3 The other breathing now another spright,4 And fiercely each assayling, gan afresh to fight.

36

Long while they then continued in that wize, As if but then the battell had begonne: Strokes, wounds, wards,5 weapons, all they did despise, Ne either car’d to ward, or perill shonne, Desirous both to have the battell donne; Ne either cared life to save or spill,

1 2

throw: strike. imprest: imprinted.

3

blend: blind.

4 Having lost Diamond’s spirit, he now pro-

ceeds to use his own. 5

wards: defensive postures; defenses.

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Ne which of them did winne, ne which were wonne. So wearie both of fighting had their fill, That life it selfe seemd loathsome, and long safetie ill. 37

Whilst thus the case in doubtfull ballance hong, Unsure to whether1 side it would incline, And all mens eyes and hearts, which there among Stood gazing, filled were with rufull tine, And secret feare, to see their fatall fine,2 All suddenly they heard a troublous noyes, That seemd some perilous tumult to desine,3 Confusd4 with womens cries, and shouts of boyes, Such as the troubled Theaters oftimes annoyes.

38

Thereat the Champions both stood still a space, To weeten what that sudden clamour ment; Lo where they spyde with speedie whirling pace, One in a charet of straunge furniment,5 Towards them driving like a storme out sent. The charet decked was in wondrous wize, With gold and many a gorgeous ornament, After the Persian Monarks antique guize, Such as the maker selfe could best by art devize.

39

And drawne it was (that wonder is to tell)6 Of two grim lyons, taken from the wood, In which their powre all others did excell; Now made forget their former cruell mood, T’obey their riders hest,7 as seemed good. And therein sate a Ladie passing faire And bright, that seemed borne of Angels brood, And with her beautie bountie did compare,8 Whether9 of them in her should have the greater share.

1

whether: which. fine: finish. 3 desine: indicate. (OED “design” v. I.1. trans. Not in the OED as a variant spelling, but the seven times Spenser uses this word conform with this definition.) 4 Confusd: mingled. 2

5

charet: chariot; furniment: fittings. that wonder is to tell: a standard formula. 7 hest: command. 8 bountie: goodness, virtue; compare: compete. 9 Whether: which. 6

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40

Thereto she learned was in Magicke leare,1 And all the artes, that subtill wits discover, Having therein bene trained many a yeare, And well instructed by the Fay her mother, That in the same she farre exceld all other. Who understanding by her mightie art, Of th’evill plight, in which her dearest brother Now stood, came forth in hast to take his part, And pacifie the strife, which causd so deadly smart.

41

And as she passed through th’unruly preace2 Of people, thronging thicke her to behold, Her angrie teame breaking their bonds of peace, Great heapes of them, like sheepe in narrow fold, For hast did over-runne, in dust enrould,3 That thorough rude confusion of the rout, Some fearing shriekt, some being harmed hould,4 Some laught for sport, some did for wonder shout, And some that would seeme wise, their wonder turnd to dout.

42

In her right hand a rod of peace shee bore, About the which two Serpents weren wound, Entrayled mutually in lovely lore,5 And by the tailes together firmely bound, And both were with one olive garland crownd, Like to the rod which Maias sonne6 doth wield, Wherewith the hellish fiends he doth confound. And in her other hand a cup she hild, The which was with Nepenthe7 to the brim upfild.

1

leare: lore. preace: crowd. 3 Like most relatively wealthy Elizabethans, Spenser may not have seen any contradiction in bringing Concord to his country— and to Ireland—over the trampled bodies of ordinary people. Like Sidney, Shakespeare, and many others, he seems more often to have thought of the lower classes of people as mobs or potential criminals than as citizens with personal aspirations. 4 hould: howled. 2

5

Entrayled: entwined; lovely lore: loving fashion; loving instruction. Canacee holds a caduceus, a staff twined with two snakes (or two representations of snakes), such as was supposedly carried by the god Mercury and in ancient Greece and Rome by heralds. Mercury was often described as having the power to cause people to sleep and to cause the fiends of the underworld to obey him. 6 Maias sonne: Mercury. 7 Nepenthe: a mythological drug supposed to eradicate grief.

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43

Nepenthe is a drinck of soverayne grace, Devized by the Gods, for to asswage Harts grief, and bitter gall away to chace, Which stirs up anguish and contentious rage: In stead thereof sweet peace and quiet age1 It doth establish in the troubled mynd. Few men, but such as sober are and sage, Are by the Gods to drinck thereof assynd; But such as drinck, eternall happinesse do fynd.

44

Such famous men, such worthies of the earth, As Jove will have advaunced to the skie, And there made gods, though borne of mortall berth,2 For their high merits and great dignitie,3 Are wont, before they may to heaven flie, To drincke hereof, whereby all cares forepast Are washt away quite from their memorie. So did those olde Heroes hereof taste, Before that they in blisse amongst the Gods were plaste.

45

Much more of price and of more gratious powre4 Is this, then that same water of Ardenne, The which Rinaldo drunck in happie howre,5 Described by that famous Tuscane penne: For that had might to change the hearts of men Fro love to hate, a change of evill choise: But this doth hatred make in love to brenne,6 And heavy heart with comfort doth rejoyce. Who would not to this vertue rather yeeld his voice?

46

At last arriving by the listes side, Shee with her rod did softly smite the raile, Which straight flew ope, and gave her way to ride. Eftsoones out of her Coch she gan availe,7

1

quiet age: quietage, quietude, calm. berth: birth. 3 dignitie: worth. 4 price: value; gratious powre: power to bestow grace. 2

5

Either the fountain of hate from which Ranaldo drank in Boiardo’s Orlando Innamorato (1.3.34–36) or the fountains of love and hate from which Rinaldo drank in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (1.78–79). 6 brenne: burn. 7 Coch: coach; availe: descend.

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And pacing fairely forth, did bid all haile, First to her brother, whom she loved deare, That so to see him made her heart to quaile: And next to Cambell, whose sad ruefull cheare Made her to change her hew, and hidden love t’appeare. 47

They lightly her requit1 (for small delight They had as then her long to entertaine,) And eft them turned both againe to fight, Which when she saw, downe on the bloudy plaine Her selfe she threw, and teares gan shed amaine;2 Amongst her teares immixing prayers meeke, And with her prayers reasons to restraine, From blouddy strife, and blessed peace to seeke, By all that unto them was deare, did them beseeke.3

48

But when as all might nought with them prevaile, Shee smote them lightly with her powrefull wand. Then suddenly as if their hearts did faile, Their wrathfull blades downe fell out of their hand, And they like men astonisht still did stand. Thus whilest their minds were doubtfully distraught,4 And mighty spirites bound with mightier band, Her golden cup to them for drinke she raught,5 Whereof full glad for thirst, ech drunk an harty draught.

49

Of which so soone as they once tasted had, Wonder it is that sudden change to see: Instead of strokes, each other kissed glad, And lovely haulst6 from feare of treason free, And plighted hands for ever friends to be.7 When all men saw this sudden change of things,

1

requit: greeted in return. amaine: vehemently. 3 beseeke: beseech. 4 distraught: distracted. 5 raught: reached, handed. 6 lovely haulst: lovingly embraced. 2

7

Cavanagh interprets this new friendship between Canacee’s brother and her future husband in terms of Levi-Strauss’ investigations into the reasons for prohibitions against incest: once Cambello gives up his vaguely incestuous protection of his sister, he forms a sociopolitical bond with another man (Cavanagh 79).

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So mortall foes so friendly to agree, For passing joy, which so great marvaile brings, They all gan shout aloud, that all the heaven rings. 50

All which, when gentle Canacee beheld, In hast she from her lofty chaire descended, To weet what sudden tidings was befeld: Where when she saw that cruell war so ended, And deadly foes so faithfully affrended,1 In lovely wise she gan that Lady greet, Which had so great dismay so well amended, And entertaining her with curt’sies2 meet, Profest to her true friendship and affection sweet.

51

Thus when they all accorded goodly were, The trumpets sounded, and they all arose, Thence to depart with glee and gladsome chere.3 Those warlike champions both together chose, Homeward to march, themselves there to repose, And wise Cambina taking by her side Faire Canacee, as fresh as morning rose, Unto her Coch remounting, home did ride, Admir’d4 of all the people, and much glorifide.

52

Where making joyous feast theire daies they spent In perfect love, devoide of hatefull strife, Allide with bands of mutuall couplement;5 For Triamond had Canacee to wife, With whom he ledd a long and happie life; And Cambel tooke Cambina to his fere,6 The which as life were each to other liefe. So all alike did love, and loved were, That since their days such lovers were not found elswere.7

1

affrended: changed into friends; reconciled. 2 curt’sies: courtesies. 3 glee: joy; entertainment; music; chere: gaiety; mirth; mood.

4

Admir’d: marveled at. couplement: pairings. 6 fere: mate. 7 elswere: elsewhere. 5

Canto Four Satyrane makes a Turneyment For love of Florimell: Britomart winnes the prize from all, And Artegall doth quell.

1

It often fals, (as here it earst befell) That mortall foes doe turne to faithfull frends, And friends profest1 are chaungd to foemen fell: The cause of both, of both their minds depends, And th’end of both likewise of both their ends.2 For enmitie, that of no ill proceeds, But of occasion, with th’occasion ends; And friendship, which a faint affection breeds Without regard of good, dyes like ill grounded seeds.

2

That well (me seemes) appeares, by that3 of late Twixt Cambell and Sir Triamond befell, As els by this, that now a new debate Stird up twixt Scudamour4 and Paridell, The which by course befals me here to tell: Who having those two other Knights espide Marching afore, as ye remember well, Sent forth their Squire5 to have them both descride, And eke those masked Ladies riding them beside.6

3

Who backe returning, told as he had seene, That they were doughtie knights of dreaded name; And those two Ladies, their two loves unseene;

1

profest: declared; pretended. end: result; ends: goals, intentions. 3 that: that which. 4 Scudamour: an error for Blandamour. Although Blandamour and Paridell do not begin a “new debate” until v.24, Scudamour cannot logically be present when 2

Britomart displays Amoret at v.13, since at v.28–34 we learn that Scudamour was elsewhere, still firmly believing that Britomart was a male knight who abducted Amoret. 5 their Squire: the Squire of Dames. 6 The narrative now picks up where it left off at ii.31.

305

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And therefore wisht them without blot or blame, To let them passe at will, for dread of shame. But Blandamour full of vainglorious spright, And rather stird by his discordfull Dame,1 Upon them gladly would have prov’d his might, But that he yet was sore of his late lucklesse fight.2 4

Yet nigh approching, he them fowle bespake, Disgracing3 them, him selfe thereby to grace, As was his wont, so weening way to make To Ladies love, where so he came in place,4 And with lewd termes their lovers to deface.5 Whose sharpe provokement them incenst so sore, That both were bent t’avenge his usage base, And gan their shields addresse them selves afore: For evill deedes may better then bad words be bore.6

5

But faire Cambina with perswasions myld, Did mitigate the fiercenesse of their mode,7 That for the present they were reconcyld, And gan to treate8 of deeds of armes abrode, And strange adventures, all the way they rode: Amongst the which they told, as then befell, Of that great turney, which was blazed brode,9 For that rich girdle of faire Florimell, The prize of her, which did in beautie most excell.

6

To which folke-mote10 they all with one consent, Sith each of them his Ladie had him by, Whose beautie each of them thought excellent,11 Agreed to travell, and their fortunes try.12

1

10 folke-mote: in A View of the Present State

2

of Ireland, Spenser describes folk-motes as gathering places bounded by earthen walls, where the native Irish held public discussions to settle disputes—and to raise mischief against the English (Spenser, View, 77). Here, the folke-mote is a place where knights go to settle their disputes militarily. 11 excellent: best. 12 I.e., each knight will fight to prove his lady the most beautiful.

discordfull Dame: Ate. I.e., his fight with Paridell (ii.11–20). 3 Disgracing: insulting. 4 in place: there. 5 deface: defame. 6 bore: borne. 7 mode: mood. 8 treate: talk. 9 blazed: blazoned, proclaimed; brode: widely.

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So as they passed forth, they did espy One in bright armes, with ready speare in rest, That toward them his course seem’d to apply, Gainst whom Sir Paridell himselfe addrest, Him weening, ere he nigh approcht to have represt. 7

Which th’other seeing, gan his course relent,1 And vaunted2 speare eftsoones to disadvaunce, As if he naught but peace and pleasure ment, Now falne into their fellowship by chance, Whereat they shewed curteous countenaunce. So as he rode with them accompanide, His roving eie did on the Lady glaunce, Which Blandamour had riding by his side: Whom sure he weend, that he somwhere tofore3 had eide.

8

It was to weete that snowy Florimell, Which Ferrau late from Braggadochio wonne,4 Whom he now seeing, her remembred well,5 How having reft her from the witches sonne, He soone her lost: wherefore he now begunne To challenge6 her anew, as his owne prize, Whom formerly he had in battell wonne, And proffer made by force her to reprize,7 Which scornefull offer, Blandamour gan soone despize.

9

And said, “Sir Knight, sith ye this Lady clame, Whom he that hath, were loth to lose so light, (For so to lose a Lady, were great shame) Yee shall her winne, as I have done in fight: And lo shee shall be placed here in sight Together with this Hag beside her set, That who so winnes her, may her have by right: But he shall have the Hag that is ybet,8 And with her alwaies ride, till he another get.”

1

relent: slacken. vaunted: displayed proudly. 3 tofore: before. 4 At III.viii.15–19. 5 We now see that Braggadocchio is the newcomer in “bright armes” whose 2

“vaunted” spear quickly came down when he was intimidated by Paridell (stanzas 6 and 7). 6 challenge: make a challenge for; claim. 7 proffer: offer; attempt; reprize: reclaim. 8 ybet: beaten.

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10

That offer pleased all the company, So Florimell with Ate forth was brought, At which they all gan laugh full merrily:1 But Braggadochio said, he never thought For such an Hag, that seemed worse then nought, His person to emperill so in fight. But if to match that Lady they had sought Another like, that were like faire and bright, His life he then would spend to justifie his right.2

11

At which his vaine excuse they all gan smile, As scorning his unmanly cowardize: And Florimell him fowly gan revile, That for her sake refus’d to enterprize The battell, offred in so knightly wize. And Ate eke provokt him privily, With love of her, and shame of such mesprize.3 But naught he car’d for friend or enemy, For in base mind nor friendship dwels nor enmity.

12

But Cambell thus did shut up all in jest, “Brave Knights and Ladies, certes ye doe wrong To stirre up strife, when most us needeth rest, That we may us reserve both fresh and strong, Against the Turneiment which is not long.4 When who so list to fight, may fight his fill, Till then your challenges ye may prolong;5 And then it shall be tried, if ye will, Whether6 shall have the Hag, or hold the Lady still.”

1 Plays, poems, and romance narratives written during the sixteenth century are almost unanimous in considering elderly women fair game for scornful humor and for disgust, unless they are speaking of actual women who are patrons or potential patrons. Cf. i.17–19 and notes. 2 I.e., Braggadocchio is unwilling to risk fighting when he has a chance of losing and being stuck with Ate, but he offers to participate in the tournament if, instead of the

Snowy Florimell and Ate, the prizes offered to the winner and loser will both be as beautiful as the Snowy Florimell. It would be unheard of to reward the victor and loser equally, so Braggadocchio is risking nothing in making this proposal. 3 mesprize: contempt; slander. 4 Against: in preparation for; long: far off (in time). 5 prolong: postpone. 6 Whether: which one.

Canto Four

13

They all agreed, so turning all to game, And pleasaunt bord,1 they past forth on their way, And all that while, where so they rode or came, That masked Mock-knight2 was their sport and play. Till that at length upon th’appointed day, Unto the place of turneyment they came; Where they before them found in fresh aray Manie a brave knight, and manie a daintie dame Assembled, for to get the honour of that game.

14

There this faire crewe arriving, did divide Them selves asunder: Blandamour with those Of his, on th’one; the rest on th’other side.3 But boastfull Braggadocchio rather chose, For glorie vaine their fellowship to lose, That men on him the more might gaze alone.4 The rest them selves in troupes did else dispose, Like as it seemed best to every one; The knights in couples marcht, with ladies linckt attone.

15

Then first of all forth came Sir Satyrane, Bearing that precious relicke in an arke Of gold, that bad eyes might it not prophane:5 Which drawing softly forth out of the darke, He open shewd, that all men it mote marke. A gorgeous girdle, curiously embost With pearle and precious stone, worth many a marke;6 Yet did the workmanship farre passe the cost: It was the same, which lately Florimel had lost.

1

bord: bourd, joking. masked Mock-knight: Braggadocchio, who was masquerading as a knight when in fact he is a coward. 3 Just before the tournament, on one side are the false friends: Blandamour, the Snowy Florimell, Paridell, Ate, Duessa, and possibly the Squire of Dames. On the other side are the true friends: Cambello, Cambina, Triamond, and Canacee. Braggadocchio, who is capable neither of friendship nor of enmity (stanza 11.8–9), is on neither 2

309

side. During the tournament itself, however, all of the above fight against Satyrane and several other Knights of Maidenhead (for which military order, see III.viii.47.7.n.). Thus the forces of false and true friendship battle the forces of chastity. 4 alone: if he is alone. 5 Cf. the Ark of the Covenant of the ancient Hebrews, which, once placed in the Temple, could not be seen by any but the high priest. 6 marke: a unit of currency.

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16

That same aloft he hong in open vew, To be the prize of beautie and of might; The which eftsoones discovered, to it drew The eyes of all, allur’d with close delight, And hearts quite robbed1 with so glorious sight, That all men threw out vowes and wishes vaine. Thrise happie Ladie, and thrise happie knight, Them seemd that could so goodly riches gaine, So worthie of the perill, worthy of the paine.

17

Then tooke the bold Sir Satyrane in hand An huge great speare,2 such as he wont to wield, And vauncing forth from all the other band Of knights, addrest his maiden-headed shield,3 Shewing him selfe all ready for the field. Gainst whom there singled from the other side A Painim4 knight, that well in armes was skild, And had in many a battell oft bene tride, Hight Bruncheval5 the bold, who fiersly forth did ride.

18

So furiously they both together met, That neither could the others force sustaine; As two fierce Buls,6 that strive the rule to get Of all the heard, meete with so hideous maine,7 That both rebutted, tumble on the plaine: So these two champions to the ground were feld, Where in a maze they both did long remaine, And in their hands their idle troncheons8 held, Which neither able were to wag, or once to weld.9

1

robbed: ravished. An huge great speare: the phallic comedy is complicated, given that here and in Britomart’s entire story, Spenser uses large spears to emblematize the defense of chastity. 3 maiden-headed shield: at III.vii.30.6, Satyrane’s shield displays a satyr’s head, but here he represents the Knights of Maidenhead (see III.viii.47.7.n.). 2

4

Painim: pagan. Bruncheval: his name can be interpreted “Brown Knight,” “Brown Horse,” “Dark Knight,” or “Dark Horse” (French). 6 Note the animal imagery used to describe masculinity throughout this episode. 7 maine: force. 8 troncheons: broken spear shafts. 9 wag: brandish; weld: wield. 5

Canto Four

19

Which when the noble Ferramont1 espide, He pricked forth in ayd of Satyran; And him against Sir Blandamour did ride With all the strength and stifnesse2 that he can. But the more strong and stiffely that he ran, So much more sorely to the ground he fell, That on an heape were tumbled horse and man. Unto whose rescue forth rode Paridell; But him likewise with that same speare he3 eke did quell.

20

Which Braggadocchio seeing, had no will To hasten greatly to his parties ayd, Albee his turne were next; but stood there still, As one that seemed doubtfull or dismayd.4 But Triamond halfe wroth to see him staid,5 Sternly stept forth, and raught away his speare, With which so sore he Ferramont assaid,6 That horse and man to ground he quite did beare, That neither could in hast themselves againe upreare.

21

Which to avenge, Sir Devon7 him did dight, But with no better fortune then the rest: For him likewise he quickly downe did smight, And after him Sir Douglas him addrest, And after him Sir Paliumord forth prest, But none of them against his strokes could stand, But all the more,8 the more his praise increst. For either they were left uppon the land, Or went away sore wounded of his haplesse9 hand.

1 Ferramont: the name means either “Iron Mount” or “Iron Tools” (Latin). He fights for the Knights of Maidenhead. 2 stifnesse: firmness; strength. Given that he fights against the Knights of Maidenhead, his stiffness suggests the hardness of an erection. 3 he: Satyrane. 4 dismayd: Spenser’s favorite pun is especially intriguing here, given that Brag-

311

gadocchio’s opponents are supposed to be defending virginity. 5 staid: stayed, motionless. 6 assaid: assailed. 7 Sirs Devon, Douglas, and Palimord fight for the Knights of Maidenhead. 8 all the more: the more of them there were. 9 of: by; haplesse: causing mishap.

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22

And now by this, Sir Satyrane abraid,1 Out of the swowne, in which too long he lay; And looking round about, like one dismaid, When as he saw the mercilesse affray, Which doughty Triamond had wrought that day, Unto the noble Knights of Maidenhead, His mighty heart did almost rend in tway,2 For very gall, that rather wholly dead Himselfe he wisht have beene, then in so bad a stead.

23

Eftsoones he gan to gather up around His weapons, which lay scattered all abrode, And as it fell, his steed he ready found. On whom remounting, fiercely forth he rode, Like sparke of fire that from the andvile glode,3 There where he saw the valiant Triamond Chasing, and laying on them heavy lode, That none his force were able to withstond, So dreadfull were his strokes, so deadly was his hond.

24

With that at him his beamlike speare he aimed, And thereto all his power and might applide: The wicked steele for mischiefe first ordained, And having now misfortune got for guide, Staid not, till it arrived in his4 side, And therein made a very griesly wound, That streames of bloud his armour all bedide.5 Much was he daunted with that direfull stound, That scarse he him upheld from falling in a sound.6

25

Yet as he might, himselfe he soft7 withdrew Out of the field, that none perceiv’d it plaine, Then gan the part8 of Chalengers anew To range the field, and victorlike to raine, That none against them battell durst maintaine.

1

by this: by this time; abraid: started up; burst into motion. 2 in tway: in two. 3 andvile: anvil; glode: glided. 4 his: Triamond’s.

5

bedide: dyed. sound: swoon. 7 soft: unobtrusively (literally quietly). 8 part: faction. 6

Canto Four

313

By that the gloomy evening on them fell, That forced them from fighting to refraine, And trumpets sound to cease did them compell, So Satyrane that day was judg’d to beare the bell.1 26

The morrow next the Turney gan anew, And with the first the hardy Satyrane Appear’d in place, with all his noble crew, On th’other side, full many a warlike swaine, Assembled were, that glorious prize to gaine. But mongst them all, was not Sir Triamond, Unable he new battell to darraine,2 Through grievaunce of his late received wound, That doubly did him grieve, when so himselfe he found.

27

Which Cambell seeing, though he could not salve,3 Ne done undoe, yet for to salve4 his name, And purchase honour in his friends behalve,5 This goodly counterfesaunce he did frame.6 The shield and armes well knowne to be the same, Which Triamond had worne, unwares to wight, And to his friend unwist, for doubt of blame, If he misdid, he on himselfe did dight,7 That none could him discerne, and so went forth to fight.

28

There Satyrane Lord of the field he found, Triumphing in great joy and jolity; Gainst whom none able was to stand on ground; That much he gan his glorie to envy, And cast t’avenge his friends indignity. A mightie speare eftsoones at him he bent;

1

beare the bell: win the day’s competition (from the bell worn by the wether that leads a flock of sheep). 2 darraine: prepare for. 3 salve: remedy. 4 salve: preserve. 5 behalve: behalf. 6 counterfesaunce: deception; frame: devise.

7

Cambello puts on Triamond’s arms in order to frighten their foes into thinking Triamond is still fighting. He does not tell Triamond in advance, in case the plan does not turn out well. Given that Triamond will be blamed if Cambello does not fight well, Cambello’s aversion to telling Triamond of his plan seems flawed.

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Who seeing him come on so furiously, Met him mid-way with equall hardiment, That forcibly to ground they both together went. 29

They up againe them selves can1 lightly reare, And to their tryed swords them selves betake; With which they wrought such wondrous marvels there, That all the rest it did amazed make, Ne any dar’d their perill to partake;2 Now cuffling3 close, now chacing to and fro, Now hurtling round advantage for to take: As two wild Boares together grapling go, Chaufing and foming choler4 each against his fo.

30

So as they courst, and turneyd here and theare, It chaunst Sir Satyrane his steed at last, Whether through foundring or through sodein feare To stumble, that his rider nigh he cast; Which vauntage Cambell did pursue so fast, That ere him selfe he had recovered well, So sore he sowst him on the compast creast,5 That forced him to leave his loftie sell, And rudely tumbling downe under his horse feete fell.

31

Lightly Cambello leapt downe from his steed, For to have rent his shield and armes away, That whylome wont to be the victors meed;6 When all unwares he felt an hideous sway Of many swords, that lode on him did lay. An hundred knights had him enclosed round, To rescue Satyrane out of his pray;7 All which at once huge strokes on him did pound, In hope to take him prisoner, where he stood on ground.

1

5

2

6

can: gan, did. partake: share. 3 cuffling: scuffling (?). The OED is doubtful of the definition and gives only this example. 4 Chaufing: chafing; fuming; foming choler: foaming bile; foaming with anger.

compast creast: round helmet. It was standard practice to take the armor and weapons from one’s slain foe as trophies. 7 out of his pray: from being Cambello’s prey.

Canto Four

32

He with their multitude was nought dismayd, But with stout courage turnd upon them all, And with his brondiron1 round about him layd; Of which he dealt large almes,2 as did befall: Like as a Lion that by chaunce doth fall Into the hunters toile,3 doth rage and rore, In royall heart disdaining to be thrall. But all in vaine: for what might one do more? They have him taken captive, though it grieve him sore.

33

Whereof when newes to Triamond was brought, There as he lay, his wound he soone forgot, And starting up, streight for his armour sought: In vaine he sought; for there he found it not; Cambello it away before had got: Cambelloes armes therefore he on him threw,4 And lightly issewd forth to take his lot. There he in troupe5 found all that warlike crew, Leading his friend away, full sorie to his vew.

34

Into the thickest of that knightly preasse He thrust, and smote downe all that was betweene, Caried with fervent zeale, ne did he ceasse, Till that he came, where he had Cambell seene, Like captive thral two other Knights atweene,6 There he amongst them cruell havocke makes; That they which lead him, soone enforced beene To let him loose, to save their proper stakes,7 Who being freed, from one a weapon fiercely takes.

35

With that he drives at them with dreadfull might, Both in remembrance of his friends late harme, And in revengement of his owne despight, So both together give a new allarme,8

1

brondiron: sword. I.e., with which he generously distributed blows (as one would generously distribute money for charity). 3 toile: net; trap. 4 Hamilton comments that “in an exemplum of erotic friendship, they fight in one another’s arms” (Hamilton, iv.27.7–8.n.). 2

5

315

in troupe: in a group; in large numbers; in battle array. 6 atweene: between. 7 their proper stakes: their own chances of living. 8 allarme: unexpected attack; call to arms.

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As if but now the battell wexed warme. As when two greedy Wolves doe breake by force Into an heard, farre from the husband farme,1 They spoile and ravine without all2 remorse, So did these two through all the field their foes enforce.3 36

Fiercely they followd on their bolde emprize, Till trumpets sound did warne them all to rest; Then all with one consent did yeeld the prize To Triamond and Cambell as the best. But Triamond to Cambell it relest. And Cambell it to Triamond transferd; Each labouring t’advance the others gest, And make his praise before his owne preferd: So that the doome was to another day differd.4

37

The last day came, when all those knightes againe Assembled were their deedes of armes to shew. Full many deedes that day were shewed plaine: But Satyrane bove all the other crew, His wondrous worth declared5 in all mens view. For from the first he to the last endured, And though some while6 Fortune from him withdrew, Yet evermore his honour he recured,7 And with unwearied powre his party still assured.

38

Ne was there Knight that ever thought of armes, But that his utmost prowesse there made knowen, That by their many wounds, and carelesse harmes,8 By shivered speares, and swords all under strowen,9 By scattered shields was easie to be showen. There might ye see loose steeds at randon ronne,

1

husband farme: farmer’s house; tilled land. 2 without all: completely without. 3 enforce: drive. 4 doome: decision about who has won; differd: deferred (with a possible pun on “differed”).

5

declared: demonstrated. some while: at times. 7 recured: restored. 8 carelesse harmes: injuries that they ignored. 9 strowen: strewn. 6

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317

Whose luckelesse riders late were overthrowen; And squiers make hast to helpe their Lords fordonne,1 But still the Knights of Maidenhead the better wonne. 39

Till that there entred on the other side,2 A straunger knight, from whence no man could reed, In quyent disguise, full hard to be descride.3 For all his armour was like salvage weed,4 With woody mosse bedight, and all his steed With oaken leaves attrapt,5 that seemed fit For salvage wight, and thereto well agreed His word,6 which on his ragged shield was writ, Salvagesse sans finesse, shewing secret wit.7

40

He at his first incomming, charg’d his spere At him, that first appeared in his sight: That was to weet, the stout Sir Sangliere,8 Who well was knowen to be a valiant Knight, Approved oft in many a perlous fight. Him at the first encounter downe he smote,

1

fordonne: utterly done in; exhausted; overthrown. 2 on the other side: on the side against the Knights of Maidenhead. 3 quyent: strange; ingenious; descride: described; figured out. 4 As Hamilton points out, Elizabethan tournaments often featured someone dressed up as a wild man. In general, Elizabethans were fascinated with so-called “wild” peoples, such as Africans and Native Americans, who helped Europeans define their own noble civility in contrast to what they thought of as the bestial or fiendish qualities of the non-Christian and less technologically developed cultures. At the same time, however, Europeans believed that “wild” peoples showed them what their own Celtic ancestors were like. Another inter-

pretation that they made of such peoples— apparently contradictory, but freely mingled with the above interpretations—was that those peoples represented a prelapsarian innocence, before the corrupting effects of civilization. 5 attrapt: decked out. 6 word: motto. 7 Salvagesse sans finesse: savagery without refinement; secret wit: secret meaning of the motto, but also the humor of having a wild man sport a French motto. From the time of the Norman Conquest until the time of Chaucer, French had been the language of the English court and aristocracy—the language of power, education, and refinement. 8 Sangliere: the name means “wild boar” (French).

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And overbore beyond his crouper1 quight, And after him another Knight, that hote2 Sir Brianor, so sore, that none him life behote.3 41

Then ere his hand he reard,4 he overthrew Seven Knights one after other as they came: And when his speare was brust,5 his sword he drew, The instrument of wrath, and with the same Far’d6 like a lyon in his bloodie game, Hewing, and slashing shields, and helmets bright, And beating downe, what ever nigh him came, That every one gan shun his dreadfull sight, No lesse then death it selfe, in daungerous affright.

42

Much wondred all men, what, or whence he came, That did amongst the troupes so tyrannize; And each of other gan inquire his name. But when they could not learne it by no wize,7 Most answerable8 to his wyld disguize It seemed, him to terme the salvage knight. But certes his right name was otherwize, Though knowne to few, that Arthegall 9 he hight, The doughtiest knight that liv’d that day, and most of might.

43

Thus was Sir Satyrane with all his band By his sole manhood and atchievement stout Dismayd, that none of them in field durst stand, But beaten were, and chased all about. So he10 continued all that day throughout, Till evening, that the Sunne gan downward bend.11

1

overbore: note the pun on “boar”; crouper: crupper, the horse’s rump or the strap that loops from the saddle under the horse’s tail. 2 hote: hight, was named. 3 Brianor: the name suggests “bruin,” meaning “bear”; it also may derive from Irish Gaelic names; behote: promised, assured. 4 I.e., before raising his sword. 5 brust: burst, shattered.

6

Far’d: conducted himself; raged. wize: means. 8 answerable: corresponding, fitting. 9 For the name, see III.ii.8.9.n. 10 he: Artegall. 11 Hamilton notes that the masculine power of the sun (associated with the god Phoebus Apollo) is about to be displaced by the feminine power of the moon (associated with the goddess Diana, also known as Phoebe). 7

Canto Four

319

Then rushed forth out of the thickest rout A stranger knight, that did his glorie shend: So nought may be esteemed happie till the end. 44

He at his entrance charg’d his powrefull speare At Artegall, in middest of his pryde, And therewith smote him on his Umbriere1 So sore, that tombling backe, he downe did slyde Over his horses taile above a stryde;2 Whence litle lust he had to rise againe. Which Cambell seeing, much the same envyde, And ran at him with all his might and maine; But shortly was likewise seene lying on the plaine.

45

Whereat full inly wroth was Triamond, And cast t’avenge the shame doen to his freend: But by his friend himselfe eke soone he fond, In no lesse neede of helpe, then him he weend. All which when Blandamour from end to end Beheld, he woxe therewith displeased sore, And thought in mind it shortly to amend: His speare he feutred,3 and at him it bore; But with no better fortune, then the rest afore.

46

Full many others at him likewise ran: But all of them likewise dismounted were, Ne certes wonder; for no powre of man Could bide the force of that enchaunted speare, The which this famous Britomart did beare;4 With which she wondrous deeds of arms atchieved, And overthrew, what ever came her neare, That all those stranger knights full sore agrieved, And that late weaker band of chalengers relieved.

1

Umbriere: visor of a helmet. above a stryde: more than the length of a stride behind his horse. 3 feutred: set in its rest, ready for action. 2

4

In other words, Spenser has been teasing us with all of the male pronouns above. For her spear’s enchantment, see III.iii.60.

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47

Like as in sommers day when raging heat Doth burne the earth,1 and boyled rivers drie, That all brute beasts forst to refraine fro meat,2 Doe hunt for shade, where shrowded they may lie, And missing it, faine from themselves to flie; All travellers tormented are with paine: A watry cloud doth overcast the skie, And poureth forth a sudden shoure of raine, That all the wretched world recomforteth againe.

48

So did the warlike Britomart restore The prize, to knights of Maydenhead that day, Which else was like to have bene lost, and bore The prayse of prowesse from them all away. Then shrilling trompets loudly gan to bray, And bad them leave their labours and long toyle, To joyous feast and other gentle play, Where beauties prize3 shold win that pretious spoyle: Where I with sound of trompe will also rest a whyle.

1

As Artegall raged among the knights while the sun shone. 2 meat: food.

3 beauties prize: the woman chosen as most beautiful.

Canto Five The Ladies for the girdle strive of famous Florimell: Scudamour comming to Cares house, doth sleepe from him expell.

1

It hath bene through all ages ever seene, That with the praise of armes and chevalrie, The prize of beautie still hath joyned beene; And that for reasons speciall privitie:1 For either doth on other much relie. For he me seemes most fit the faire to serve, That can her best defend from villenie; And she most fit his service doth deserve, That fairest is and from her faith will never swerve.

2

So fitly now here commeth next in place, After the proofe of prowesse ended well, The controverse2 of beauties soveraine grace; In which to her that doth the most excell, Shall fall the girdle of faire Florimell: That many wish to win for glorie vaine, And not for vertuous use, which some doe tell That glorious belt did in it selfe containe, Which Ladies ought to love, and seeke for to obtaine.

3

That girdle gave the vertue of chast love, And wivehood true, to all that did it beare;3 But whosoever contrarie doth prove, Might not the same about her middle weare, But it would loose, or else a sunder teare. Whilome it was (as Faeries wont report)

1 for reasons speciall privitie: because of special secrets that Reason knows about. 2 controverse: controversy.

3 Cf. the girdles that excite desire in Homer’s Iliad (14.214–21) and in Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata (16.24–25), along with the girdle that restrains desire in Boccaccio’s Genealogiae (1976, 3.22 and 4.47).

321

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Dame Venus girdle, by her steemed1 deare, What time she usd to live in wively sort; But layd aside, when so she usd her looser sport.2 4

Her husband Vulcan whylome for her sake, When first he loved her with heart entire, This pretious ornament they say3 did make, And wrought in Lemno with unquenched fire: And afterwards did for her loves first hire,4 Give it to her, for ever to remaine, Therewith to bind lascivious desire, And loose affections streightly to restraine; Which vertue it for ever after did retaine.

5

The same one day, when she her selfe disposd To visite her beloved Paramoure, The God of warre,5 she from her middle loosd, And left behind her in her secret bowre, On Acidalian mount,6 where many an howre She with the pleasant Graces wont to play. There Florimell in her first ages flowre Was fostered by those Graces, (as they say) And brought with her from thence that goodly belt away.

6

That goodly belt was Cestus7 hight by name, And as her life by her esteemed deare. No wonder then, if that to winne the same So many Ladies sought, as shall appeare; For pearelesse she was thought, that did it beare. And now by this their feast all being ended, The judges which thereto selected were, Into the Martian field adowne descended, To deeme this doutfull case, for which they all contended.

1

steemed: esteemed. looser sport: sexual dalliance. 3 they say: Spenser seems to have made up the story himself, however. 4 hire: reward; payment. 2

5

God of warre: Mars. Acidalian mount: featured in VI.x as a site for pastoral song and dance. 7 Cestus: girdle, belt—especially the one worn by Venus (Latin). 6

Canto Five

7

But first was question made, which of those Knights That lately turneyd, had the wager wonne: There was it judged by those worthie wights, That Satyrane the first day best had donne: For he last ended, having first begonne. The second was to Triamond behight,1 For that he sav’d the victour from fordonne:2 For Cambell victour was in all mens sight, Till by mishap he in his foemens hand did light.

8

The third dayes prize unto that straunger Knight, Whom all men term’d Knight of the Hebene speare,3 To Britomart was given by good right; For that with puissant stroke she downe did beare The Salvage Knight, that victour was whileare, And all the rest, which had the best afore, And to the last unconquer’d did appeare; For last is deemed best. To her therefore The fayrest Ladie was adjudgd for Paramore.4

9

But thereat greatly grudged5 Arthegall, And much repynd, that both of victors meede, And eke of honour she did him forestall. Yet mote he not withstand, what was decreede; But inly thought of that despightfull deede Fit time t’awaite avenged for to bee. This being ended thus, and all agreed, Then next ensew’d the Paragon to see Of beauties praise,6 and yeeld the fayrest her due fee.

10

Then first Cambello brought unto their view His faire Cambina, covered with a veale;7 Which being once withdrawne, most perfect hew

1

behight: designated. from fordonne: from being done in. 3 Knight of the Hebene speare: this title for Britomart indicates that her spear is made of ebony, but the title also evokes Hebe, the goddess of youthly beauty and fertility, as well as Cupid, who carries a “Heben bowe” (I.Pr.3.5), and Prince 2

323

Arthur, who carries a “speare of heben wood” (I.vii.37.2). 4 I.e., she will be given the fairest lady as her lover. 5 grudged: complained. 6 I.e., the next event of the day was to see who would be praised as the Paragon of beauty. 7 veale: veil.

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And passing beautie did eftsoones reveale, That able was weake harts away to steale. Next did Sir Triamond unto their sight The face of his deare Canacee unheale;1 Whose beauties beame eftsoones did shine so bright, That daz’d the eyes of all, as with exceeding light. 11

And after her did Paridell produce His false Duessa, that she might be seene, Who with her forged beautie did seduce The hearts of some, that fairest her did weene; As diverse wits affected divers2 beene. Then did Sir Ferramont unto them shew His Lucida,3 that was full faire and sheene, And after these an hundred Ladies moe Appear’d in place, the which each other did outgoe.

12

All which who so dare thinke for to enchace,4 Him needeth sure a golden pen I weene, To tell the feature of each goodly face. For since the day that they created beene, So many heavenly faces were not seene Assembled in one place: ne he that thought For Chian folke5 to pourtraict beauties Queene, By view of all the fairest to him brought,6 So many faire did see, as here he might have sought.

13

At last the most redoubted Britonesse, Her lovely Amoret did open shew; Whose face discovered, plainely did expresse The heavenly pourtraict of bright Angels hew. Well weened all, which her that time did vew,

1

unheale: uncover for display. divers: diversely. 3 Lucida: from the Latin lucere, “to shine.” 4 enchace: portray in words (literally, to put a jewel in its setting or to engrave metal with designs). 5 Chian folke: people from the Greek island of Chios. 2

6 Zeuxis, a Greek painter in the early fourth century BC, used five women as models for his painting of Helen of Troy, choosing each model’s best features. However, Spenser may be confusing Zeuxis with Apelles, a Greek painter from slightly later in the fourth century BC, who was famous for his painting of Venus rising from the sea. It is not known for certain whether either painter was born on Chios.

Canto Five

325

That she should surely beare the bell away,1 Till Blandamour, who thought he had the trew And very Florimell, did her display: The sight of whom once seene did all the rest dismay. 14

For all afore that seemed fayre and bright, Now base and contemptible did appeare, Compar’d to her, that shone as Phebes2 light, Amongst the lesser starres in evening cleare. All that her saw with wonder ravisht weare, And weend no mortall creature she should bee,3 But some celestiall shape, that flesh did beare: Yet all were glad there Florimell to see; Yet thought that Florimell was not so faire as shee.

15

As guilefull Goldsmith that by secret skill, With golden foyle doth finely over spred Some baser metall, which commend he will Unto the vulgar for good gold insted, He much more goodly glosse thereon doth shed, To hide his falshood, then if it were trew: So hard, this Idole was to be ared, That Florimell her selfe in all mens vew She seem’d to passe: so forged things do fairest shew.

16

Then was that golden belt by doome4 of all Graunted to her, as to the fayrest Dame. Which being brought, about her middle small They thought to gird, as best it her became; But by no meanes they could it thereto frame. For ever as they fastned it, it loos’d And fell away, as feeling secret blame. Full oft about her wast5 she it enclos’d; And it as oft was from about her wast disclos’d.6

1 I.e., win the contest. The addition of the word “away” to the phrase used in iv.25.9 may represent a common confusion between the image of a bell-wether and the image of a gold or silver bell presented as a prize (OED “bell” sb1 III.7.a). 2 Phebes: the chaste goddess of the moon is Phoebe, also called Artemis (Diana).

3

As indeed she is not, being an illusion wrapped around an evil spirit. 4 doome: judgment. 5 wast: waist. 6 disclos’d: unfastened.

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17

That all men wondred at the uncouth sight, And each one thought, as to their fancies came.1 But she her selfe did thinke it doen for spight, And touched was with secret wrath and shame Therewith, as thing deviz’d her to defame. Then many other Ladies likewise tride, About their tender loynes to knit2 the same; But it would not on none of them abide, But when they thought it fast,3 eftsoones it was untide.

18

Which when that scornefull Squire of Dames did vew, He lowdly gan to laugh, and thus to jest; “Alas for pittie that so faire a crew, As like can not be seene from East to West, Cannot find one this girdle to invest.4 Fie on the man, that did it first invent, To shame us all with this, Ungirt unblest.5 Let never Ladie to his love assent, That hath this day so many so unmanly shent.”

19

Thereat all Knights gan laugh, and Ladies lowre: Till that at last the gentle Amoret Likewise assayd, to prove that girdles powre; And having it about her middle set, Did find it fit, withouten breach or let.6 Whereat the rest gan greatly to envie: But Florimell exceedingly did fret, And snatching from her hand halfe angrily The belt againe, about her bodie gan it tie.

20

Yet nathemore7 would it her bodie fit; Yet nathelesse to her, as her dew right, It yeelded was by them, that judged it: And she her selfe adjudged to the Knight, That bore the Hebene speare, as wonne in fight.

1

I.e., viewers interpreted the strange sight according to whatever came into their imaginations. 2 knit: fasten or knot together. 3 fast: secure.

4

invest: put on. This was a proverb. 6 breach: gap; let: hindrance. 7 nathemore: none the more (i.e., despite all of her efforts it would not). 5

Canto Five

327

But Britomart would not thereto assent, Ne her owne Amoret forgoe so light For that strange Dame, whose beauties wonderment She lesse esteem’d, then th’others vertuous government.1 21

Whom when the rest did see her to refuse, They were full glad, in hope themselves to get her: Yet at her choice they all did greatly muse. But after that the Judges did arret2 her Unto the second best, that lov’d her better; That was the Salvage Knight: but he was gone In great displeasure, that he could not get her. Then was she judged Triamond his one; But Triamond lov’d Canacee, and other none.3

22

Tho unto Satyran she was adjudged, Who was right glad to gaine so goodly meed: But Blandamour thereat full greatly grudged, And litle prays’d his labours evill speed,4 That for to winne the saddle, lost the steed.5 Ne lesse thereat did Paridell complaine, And thought t’appeale from that, which was decreed, To single combat with Sir Satyrane. Thereto him Ate stird, new discord to maintaine.

23

And eke with these, full many other Knights She through her wicked working did incense, Her to demaund, and chalenge6 as their rights, Deserved for their perils recompense.

1 Given that Britomart has previously revealed herself at crucial moments in the poem, we might expect her to doff her helmet here in order to show the onlookers that her sex makes her an inappropriate paramour for the Snowy Florimell. Instead, the narrator simply tells us that Britomart turns down the prize on behalf of her loyalty to “her owne Amoret.” The poem is asking us to contrast her and Amoret’s relationship with what will be the False Florimell’s relationship to any of the knights who have jousted for her, including some of the poem’s heroes.

2

arret: consign; entrust. It is proving difficult to dispose of the fairest lady of the land. 4 evill speed: poor success. 5 This proverbial saying refers here to the fact that after Blandamour finally bestirred himself to fight Ferrau for the Snowy Florimell at ii.7 (instead of following his previous habit of having Paridell fight for him), he loses her at this tournament. 6 chalenge: claim. 3

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Amongst the rest with boastfull vaine pretense1 Stept Braggadochio forth, and as his thrall Her claym’d, by him in battell wonne long sens: Whereto her selfe he did to witnesse call; Who being askt, accordingly confessed all. 24

Thereat exceeding wroth was Satyran; And wroth with Satyran was Blandamour; And wroth with Blandamour was Erivan; And at them both Sir Paridell did loure. So all together stird up strifull stoure, And readie were new battell to darraine. Each one profest to be her paramoure, And vow’d with speare and shield it to maintaine; Ne Judges powre, ne reasons rule mote them restraine.

25

Which troublous stirre when Satyrane aviz’d, He gan to cast how to appease the same, And to accord them all, this meanes deviz’d: First in the midst to set that fayrest Dame, To whom each one his chalenge should disclame, And he himselfe his right would eke releasse: Then looke to whom she voluntarie came,2 He should without disturbance her possesse: Sweete is the love that comes alone3 with willingnesse.

26

They all agreed, and then that snowy Mayd Was in the middest plast among them all; All on her gazing wisht, and vowd, and prayd, And to the Queene of beautie4 close did call, That she unto their portion might befall. Then when she long had lookt upon each one, As though she wished to have pleasd them all, At last to Braggadochio selfe alone She came of her accord, in spight of all his fone.5

1

pretense: spurious claim. I.e., each knight who currently claims the Snowy Florimell will renounce his claim, as will Satyrane. They will then set her in their midst and see toward whom she walks. The scenario is like that of parents compet-

2

ing for a toddler’s love by seeing toward whom she or he toddles. 3 alone: of its own accord. 4 Queene of beautie: Venus. 5 fone: foes.

Canto Five

27

Which when they all beheld they chaft and rag’d, And woxe nigh mad for very harts despight, That from revenge their willes they scarse asswag’d: Some thought from him her to have reft by might; Some proffer made with him for her to fight. But he nought car’d for all that they could say: For he their words as wind esteemed light. Yet not fit place he thought it there to stay, But secretly from thence that night her bore away.

28

They which remaynd, so soone as they perceiv’d, That she was gone, departed thence with speed, And follow’d them, in mind her to have reav’d1 From wight unworthie of so noble meed. In which poursuit how each one did succeede, Shall else2 be told in order, as it fell. But now of Britomart it here doth neede, The hard adventures and strange haps to tell; Since with the rest she went not after Florimell.3

29

For soone as she them saw to discord set, Her list no longer in that place abide; But taking with her lovely Amoret, Upon her first adventure forth did ride, To seeke her lov’d,4 making blind love her guide. Unluckie Mayd to seeke her enemie, Unluckie Mayd to seeke him farre and wide, Whom, when he was unto her selfe most nie, She through his late disguizement could him not descrie.

30

So much the more her griefe, the more her toyle: Yet neither toyle nor griefe she once did spare, In seeking him, that should her paine assoyle; Whereto great comfort in her sad misfare5 Was Amoret, companion of her care: Who likewise sought her lover long miswent,6

1

4

2

5

reav’d: carried away; robbed. else: elsewhere. See ix.20–36. 3 Cf. III.i.18–19, in which Britomart does not follow the men in chasing the true Florimell.

lov’d: beloved, i.e., Artegall. misfare: misfortune. 6 miswent: gone astray.

329

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The gentle Scudamour, whose hart whileare That stryfull1 hag with gealous discontent Had fild, that he to fell reveng was fully bent.2 31

Bent to revenge on blamelesse Britomart The crime, which cursed Ate kindled earst, The which like thornes did pricke his gealous hart, And through his soule like poysned arrow perst, That by no reason it might be reverst,3 For ought that Glauce could or doe or say. For aye the more that she the same reherst,4 The more it gauld, and griev’d him night and day, That nought but dire revenge his anger mote defray.

32

So as they travelled, the drouping5 night Covered with cloudie storme and bitter showre, That dreadfull seem’d to every living wight, Upon them fell, before her timely howre; That forced them to seeke some covert bowre, Where they might hide their heads in quiet rest, And shrowd their persons from that stormie stowre. Not farre away, not meete for any guest They spide a little cottage, like some poore mans nest.

33

Under a steepe hilles side it placed was, There where the mouldred6 earth had cav’d the banke; And fast beside a little brooke did pas Of muddie water, that like puddle stanke, By which few crooked sallowes7 grew in ranke: Whereto approaching nigh, they heard the sound Of many yron hammers beating ranke,8 And answering their wearie turnes9 around, That seemed some blacksmith dwelt in that desert ground.

1

stryfull: strife-causing. Ate provoked Scudamour’s jealousy at i.47–54. 3 reverst: pulled out. 4 reherst: told. 5 drouping: drooping; the word conveys 2

the image of low-hanging clouds as well as that of dropping rain. 6 mouldred: decayed; crumbled. 7 sallowes: a type of willow associated with lovers. 8 ranke: strongly; violently. 9 I.e., echoing wearily.

Canto Five

34

There entring in, they found the goodman1 selfe, Full busily unto his worke ybent; Who was to weet a wretched wearish elfe,2 With hollow eyes and rawbone cheekes forspent,3 As if he had in prison long bene pent: Full blacke and griesly did his face appeare, Besmeard with smoke that nigh his eye-sight blent;4 With rugged beard, and hoarie shagged heare, The which he never wont to combe, or comely sheare.

35

Rude was his garment, and to rags all rent, Ne better had he, ne for better cared: With blistred hands emongst the cinders brent, And fingers filthie, with long nayles unpared, Right fit to rend the food, on which he fared. His name was Care; a blacksmith by his trade, That neither day nor night, from working spared, But to small purpose yron wedges made; Those be unquiet thoughts, that carefull minds invade.

36

In which his worke he had sixe servants prest,5 About the Andvile standing evermore, With huge great hammers, that did never rest From heaping stroakes, which thereon soused sore: All sixe strong groomes, but one then other more; For by degrees they all were disagreed;6 So likewise did the hammers which they bore, Like belles in greatnesse orderly succeed, That he which was the last, the first did farre exceede.7

1 goodman: a courtesy title for any man under the rank of gentleman, sometimes used ironically (OED 3b). 2 wearish: wizened (with a pun on “weary”); elfe: Spenser sometimes uses this word to designate the natives of Faerie Land, but at other times, as here, he uses its more common definition: a malignant imp. 3 forspent: wasted away. 4 blent: blinded. 5 prest: enlisted; forced into service; at hand. 6 I.e., each differed from the next a fixed amount, and all differed from each other.

331

Nelson points out that the image comes from Pythagoras’ discovery that six different weights of a blacksmith’s hammer produced six tones that could be harmonized (Nelson, 250). Steadman observes that in Care’s house, the Pythagorean harmony becomes discord (Steadman, 157, as noted in Hamilton). In other words, these six blacksmiths’ hammers are tuned to a discordant scale. 7 I.e., the largest hammer and the servant who wielded it were considerably larger than the smallest hammer and its wielder.

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37

He like a monstrous Gyant seem’d in sight, Farre passing Bronteus, or Pyracmon1 great, The which in Lipari 2 doe day and night Frame thunderbolts for Joves avengefull threate. So dreadfully he did the andvile beat, That seem’d to dust he shortly would it drive: So huge his hammer and so fierce his heat, That seem’d a rocke of Diamond it could rive, And rend a sunder quite, if he thereto list strive.

38

Sir Scudamour there entring, much admired3 The manner of their worke and wearie paine; And having long beheld, at last enquired The cause and end thereof: but all in vaine; For they for nought would from their worke refraine, Ne let his speeches come unto their eare. And eke the breathfull bellowes blew amaine, Like to the Northren winde, that none could heare: Those Pensifenesse did move; and Sighes the bellows weare.

39

Which when that warriour saw, he said no more, But in his armour layd him downe to rest:4 To rest he layd him downe upon the flore, (Whylome for ventrous Knights the bedding best) And thought his wearie limbs to have redrest.5 And that old aged Dame, his faithfull Squire, Her feeble joynts layd eke a downe to rest; That needed much her weake age to desire,6 After so long a travell,7 which them both did tire.

40

There lay Sir Scudamour long while expecting, When gentle sleepe his heavie eyes would close; Oft chaunging sides, and oft new place electing,

1 Bronteus, or Pyracmon: two of the Cyclops in Vulcan’s smithy in Virgil’s Aeneid (8.416–53), where they and one other worker divide the work equally and strike their hammers in a measured cadence. 2 Lipari: the location of Vulcan’s smithy, according to some sources. 3 admired: marveled at.

4 Compare Britomart’s doffing her armor before resting in Malecasta’s house, signifying that she has let down her guard (III.i.58). 5 redrest: relieved; restored. 6 I.e., rest being much needed by her advanced age, she desired it; or her advanced age, needing much rest, asked for it. 7 travell: travel; travail.

Canto Five

333

Where better seem’d he mote himselfe repose; And oft in wrath he thence againe uprose; And oft in wrath he layd him downe againe. But wheresoever he did himselfe dispose, He by no meanes could wished ease obtaine: So every place seem’d painefull, and ech changing vaine. 41

And evermore, when he to sleepe did thinke, The hammers sound his senses did molest; And evermore, when he began to winke,1 The bellowes noyse disturb’d his quiet rest, Ne suffred sleepe to settle in his brest. And all the night the dogs did barke and howle About the house, at sent of stranger guest: And now the crowing Cocke, and now the Owle Lowde shriking him afflicted to the very sowle.2

42

And if by fortune any litle nap Upon his heavie eye-lids chaunst to fall, Eftsoones one of those villeins him did rap Upon his headpeece with his yron mall;3 That he was soone awaked therewithall, And lightly started up as one affrayd; Or as if one him suddenly did call. So oftentimes he out of sleepe abrayd, And then lay musing long, on that him ill apayd.4

43

So long he muzed, and so long he lay, That at the last his wearie sprite opprest With fleshly weaknesse, which no creature may Long time resist, gave place to kindly rest, That all his senses did full soone arrest: Yet in his soundest sleepe, his dayly feare His ydle braine gan busily molest,5 And made him dreame those two disloyall were: The things that day most minds,6 at night doe most appeare.

1

winke: nod off, close his eyes. sowle: soul. 3 mall: maul, a heavy, long-handled hammer. 4 that him ill apayd: that which ill pleased or ill rewarded him. 2

5 I.e., his daytime fear—that Amoret and Britomart were lovers—began to molest his sleeping brain. 6 I.e., the things that one attends to most during the day (literally, that day attends to most).

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44

With that, the wicked carle the maister Smith A paire of redwhot yron tongs did take Out of the burning cinders, and therewith Under his side him nipt, that forst to wake, He felt his hart for very paine to quake, And started up avenged for to be On him, the which his quiet slomber brake: Yet looking round about him none could see; Yet did the smart remaine, though he himselfe did flee.1

45

In such disquiet and hartfretting payne,2 He all that night, that too long night did passe. And now the day out of the Ocean mayne Began to peepe above this earthly masse, With pearly dew sprinkling the morning grasse: Then up he rose like heavie lumpe of lead, That in his face, as in a looking glasse, The signes of anguish one mote plainely read, And ghesse the man to be dismayd with gealous dread.

46

Unto his lofty steede he clombe3 anone, And forth upon his former voiage fared, And with him eke that aged Squire attone; Who whatsoever perill was prepared, Both equall paines and equall perill shared: The end whereof and daungerous event4 Shall for another canticle5 be spared. But here my wearie teeme nigh over spent Shall breath it selfe awhile, after so long a went.6

1 I.e., the pain of the blacksmith’s pinches remains although the blacksmith, himself, flees—but the phrase also means that the smart remains although Scudamour flees from himself. Cf. Redcrosse “Still flying from his thoughts and gealous feare” (I.ii.12).

2 hartfretting payne: pain that gnaws, corrodes, or consumes the heart. 3 clombe: climbed. 4 event: outcome. 5 canticle: canto (literally, little song). 6 went: journey.

Canto Six Both Scudamour and Arthegall Doe fight with Britomart, He sees her face; doth fall in love, and soone from her depart.1

1

What equall torment to the griefe of mind, And pyning anguish hid in gentle hart, That inly feeds it selfe with thoughts unkind, And nourisheth her owne consuming smart? What medicine can any Leaches2 art Yeeld such a sore, that doth her grievance hide, And will to none her maladie impart? Such was the wound that Scudamour did gride;3 For which Dan Phebus 4 selfe cannot a salve provide.

2

1

Who having left that restlesse house of Care, The next day, as he on his way did ride, Full of melancholie and sad misfare,5 Through misconceipt;6 all unawares espide An armed Knight under a forrest side, Sitting in shade beside his grazing steede; Who soone as them7 approaching he descride, Gan towards them to pricke with eger speede, That seem’d he was full bent to some mischievous deede.

Eggert observes of this comic argument that the male hero’s response to marriage in Book Four is “either to flee it . . . or to contemplate it only from several heavily mediated removes” (Eggert, 35–6). 2 Leaches: physician’s. 3 gride: pierce with an intense, rasping pain. 4 Dan Phebus: Phoebus Apollo, god of healing and sunshine as well as of plagues, politics, music, poetry, and oracles.

5 misfare: misfortune—though its placement in his mind suggests the noun “misfaring,” meaning “transgression.” 6 misconceipt: misconception—i.e., his belief that Britomart is male. 7 them: Glauce is still traveling with Scudamour. (Both in The Faerie Queene and in everyday sixteenth-century writings such as private letters, aristocrats are often described as entering or leaving a room, traveling to or from a place, without any mention of the servants who accompany them.)

335

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3

Which Scudamour perceiving, forth issewed To have rencountred him in equall race;1 But soone as th’other nigh approaching, vewed The armes he bore, his speare he gan abase, And voide2 his course: at which so suddain case He wondred much. But th’other thus can3 say; “Ah gentle Scudamour, unto your grace I me submit, and you of pardon pray, That almost had against you trespassed this day.”

4

Whereto thus Scudamour, “Small harme it were For any knight, upon a ventrous knight Without displeasance4 for to prove his spere. But reade you Sir, sith ye my name have hight, What is your owne, that I mote you requite.”5 “Certes” (sayd he) “ye mote as now excuse Me from discovering you my name aright: For time yet serves that I the same refuse,6 But call ye me the Salvage Knight, as others use.”

5

“Then this, Sir Salvage Knight” (quoth he) “areede; Or doe you here within this forrest wonne, That seemeth well to answere to your weede?7 Or have ye it for some occasion donne? That rather seemes, sith knowen armes ye shonne.”8 “This other day” (sayd he) “a stranger knight

1

rencountred: met in battle; race: act of riding rapidly on horseback in a tournament or single combat. 2 voide: turn aside to avoid. 3 can: gan, did. 4 displeasance: cause of displeasure; according to the chivalric code, two knights could fight each other unprovoked, so long as both were willing. 5 requite: return the favor (by calling you by your name). 6 I.e., it is presently still useful for me to refuse to tell you my name.

7

weede: clothing. I.e., “Tell me, do you live in this forest, as your wild clothing would seem to indicate, or have you come to the forest for some particular reason? It would seem the latter, since you are not carrying arms that identify you as a particular knight.” Scudamour is confused because, on the one hand, a woodsman normally would not carry the arms of a knight, but on the other hand, a knight would normally carry a shield or wear a tunic with a specific, recognizable coat of arms instead of the strange motto “Salvagesse sans finesse” (iv.39). 8

Canto Six

337

Shame and dishonour hath unto me donne; On whom I waite to wreake that foule despight, When ever he this way shall passe by day or night.”1 6

“Shame be his meede” (quoth he) “that meaneth shame.2 But what is he, by whom ye shamed were?” “A stranger knight,” sayd he, “unknowne by name, But knowne by fame, and by an Hebene speare, With which he all that met him, downe did beare. He in an open Turney lately held, Fro me the honour of that game did reare;3 And having me all wearie earst, downe feld, The fayrest Ladie reft, and ever since withheld.”

7

When Scudamour heard mention of that speare, He wist right well, that it was Britomart, The which from him his fairest love did beare. Tho gan he swell in every inner part, For fell despight, and gnaw his gealous hart, That thus he sharply sayd; “Now by my head,4 Yet is not this the first unknightly part, Which that same knight, whom by his launce I read, Hath doen to noble knights, that many makes him dread.5

8

“For lately he my love hath fro me reft, And eke defiled with foule villanie The sacred pledge, which in his faith was left, In shame of knighthood and fidelitie; The which ere long full deare he shall abie. And if to that avenge by you decreed6 This hand may helpe, or succour ought supplie, It shall not fayle, when so ye shall it need.” So both to wreake their wrathes on Britomart agreed.

1

In Book Five, Artegall will represent the virtue of justice in ways that modern readers tend to find problematic. Hamilton remarks of Artegall’s plans here in Book Four, “Nursing a grudge and plotting revenge show Artegall’s virtue of justice at its most primitive level.” 2 meaneth: intends. This line is a translation of the French motto of the English

Knights of the Garter: Honi soit qui mal y pense. 3 reare: take away (the only example of this usage in the OED). 4 by my head: a traditional oath. 5 I.e., that makes many dread him. 6 avenge: revenge; decreed: pronounced; determined.

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9

Whiles thus they communed,1 lo farre away A Knight soft2 ryding towards them they spyde, Attyr’d in forraine armes and straunge aray: Whom when they nigh approcht, they plaine descryde To be the same, for whom they did abyde.3 Sayd then Sir Scudamour, “Sir Salvage knight Let me this crave, sith first I was defyde, That first I may that wrong to him requite: And if I hap to fayle, you shall recure my right.”

10

Which being yeelded, he his threatfull speare Gan fewter, and against her4 fiercely ran. Who soone as she him saw approaching neare With so fell rage, her selfe she lightly gan To dight, to welcome him, well as she can: But entertaind him in so rude a wise, That to the ground she smote both horse and man; Whence neither greatly hasted to arise, But on their common harmes together did devise.5

11

But Artegall beholding his mischaunce, New matter added to his former fire; And eft6 aventring his steeleheaded launce, Against her rode, full of despiteous ire, That nought but spoyle and vengeance did require.7 But to himselfe his felonous8 intent Returning, disappointed his desire, Whiles unawares his saddle he forwent,9 And found himselfe on ground in great amazement.

12

Lightly he started up out of that stound, And snatching forth his direfull deadly blade, Did leape to her, as doth an eger hound Thrust to an Hynd10 within some covert glade,

1

The phrase emphasizes that they have formed a friendship (based on their mutual grievances). 2 soft: easily; at a calm pace. 3 abyde: wait. 4 fewter: set in its rest, ready for action; her: the pronoun reminds us of all that Artegall and Scudamour do not know.

5

devise: consult; deliberate. eft: likewise, in return. 7 require: seek. 8 felonous: violent; wicked. 9 forwent: left; forfeited. 10 Hynd: female deer. 6

Canto Six

339

Whom without perill he cannot invade.1 With such fell greedines he her assayled, That though she mounted were, yet he her made To give him ground, (so much his force prevayled) And shun his mightie strokes, gainst which no armes avayled. 13

So as they coursed here and there, it chaunst That in her wheeling round, behind her crest So sorely he her strooke, that thence it glaunst Adowne her backe, the which it fairely blest2 From foule mischance; ne did it ever rest, Till on her horses hinder parts it fell; Where byting deepe, so deadly it imprest, That quite it chynd his backe3 behind the sell, And to alight on foote her algates did compell.

14

Like as the lightning brond from riven skie, Throwne out by angry Jove in his vengeance, With dreadfull force falles on some steeple hie; Which battring, downe it on the church doth glance, And teares it all with terrible mischance. Yet she no whit dismayd, her steed forsooke, And casting from her that enchaunted lance, Unto her sword and shield her soone betooke; And therewithall at him right furiously she strooke.

15

So furiously she strooke in her first heat, Whiles with long fight on foot he breathlesse was, That she him forced backward to retreat, And yeeld unto her weapon way to pas: Whose raging rigour neither steele nor bras Could stay, but to the tender flesh it went, And pour’d the purple bloud forth on the gras; That all his mayle4 yriv’d, and plates yrent, Shew’d all his bodie bare unto the cruell dent.5

1

The imagery of sexual aggression in the advances that Scudamour and Artegall have made with their spear and lance becomes more frantic in these lines. 2 fairely blest: kept entirely safe.

3

chynd his backe: split his back (with a pun on two meanings of “chine”: “split” and “backbone”). 4 mayle: chain mail, but with a pun on “male.” 5 dent: blow.

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16

At length when as he saw her hastie heat Abate, and panting breath begin to fayle, He through long sufferance1 growing now more great, Rose in his strength, and gan her fresh assayle, Heaping huge strokes, as thicke as showre of hayle, And lashing dreadfully at every part, As if he thought her soule to disentrayle.2 Ah cruell hand, and thrise more cruell hart, That workst such wrecke3 on her, to whom thou dearest art.

17

What yron courage ever could endure, To worke such outrage on so faire a creature? And in his madnesse thinke with hands impure To spoyle so goodly workmanship of nature, The maker selfe resembling in her feature?4 Certes some hellish furie, or some feend This mischiefe framd, for their first loves defeature,5 To bath their hands in bloud of dearest freend, Thereby to make their loves beginning, their lives end.

18

Thus long they trac’d,6 and traverst to and fro, Sometimes pursewing, and sometimes pursewed, Still as advantage they espyde thereto: But toward th’end Sir Arthegall renewed His strength still more, but she still more decrewed.7 At last his lucklesse hand he heav’d on hie, Having his forces all in one accrewed,8 And therewith stroke at her so hideouslie, That seemed nought but death mote be her destinie.

19

The wicked stroke upon her helmet chaunst, And with the force, which in it selfe it bore, Her ventayle shard9 away, and thence forth glaunst

1

7

2

8

sufferance: respite, time out. disentrayle: draw out of the entrails or inward parts. 3 wrecke: injury; vengeance; outrage. 4 Note the repetition of the a- and brhymes. 5 defeature: defeat; disfigurement. 6 trac’d: pursued, with a pun on the meaning “danced.”

decrewed: decreased (cf. “accrued”). accrewed: accrued, augmented. 9 ventayle: moveable front of the helmet, either distinct from the visor or including it (depending on whether Spenser is thinking of early or late Medieval or Renaissance versions); shard: cut.

Canto Six

341

A downe in vaine, ne harm’d her any more. With that her angels face, unseene afore, Like to the ruddie morne appeard in sight, Deawed with silver drops, through sweating sore,1 But somewhat redder, then beseem’d aright, Through toylesome heate and labour of her weary fight. 20

And round about the same, her yellow heare Having through stirring loosd their wonted band, Like to a golden border did appeare, Framed in goldsmithes forge with cunning hand: Yet goldsmithes cunning could not understand To frame such subtile2 wire, so shinie cleare. For it did glister3 like the golden sand, The which Pactolus with his waters shere,4 Throwes forth upon the rivage5 round about him nere.

21

And as his hand he up againe did reare, Thinking to worke on her his utmost wracke,6 His powrelesse arme benumbd with secret feare From his revengefull purpose shronke abacke, And cruell sword out of his fingers slacke Fell downe to ground, as if the steele had sence, And felt some ruth, or sence his hand did lacke, Or both of them did thinke, obedience To doe to so divine a beauties excellence.7

22

And he himselfe long gazing thereupon, At last fell humbly downe upon his knee, And of his wonder made religion, Weening some heavenly goddesse he did see, Or else unweeting, what it else might bee; And pardon her besought his errour frayle,

1

sore: severely. subtile: fine. 3 glister: shine. 2

4 Pactolus: a river in Lydia, supposed to have golden sand; shere: clear.

5

rivage: banks. wracke: violence. 7 In Tasso’s Gerusalemme Liberata, Tancred is smitten with Clorinda’s beauty when her helmet comes off (3.21–22). 6

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

342

That had done outrage in so high degree: Whilest trembling horrour1 did his sense assayle, And made ech member2 quake, and manly hart to quayle. 23

Nathelesse she full of wrath for that late3 stroke, All that long while upheld her wrathfull hand, With fell intent, on him to bene ywroke,4 And looking sterne, still over him did stand, Threatning to strike, unlesse he would withstand:5 And bad him rise, or surely he should die. But die or live for nought he would upstand But her of pardon prayd more earnestlie, Or wreake on him her will for so great injurie.

24

Which when as Scudamour, who now abrayd, Beheld, whereas he stood not farre aside, He was therewith right wondrously dismayd, And drawing nigh, when as he plaine descride That peerelesse paterne of Dame natures pride, And heavenly image of perfection, He blest himselfe, as one sore terrifide, And turning his feare to faint devotion, Did worship her as some celestiall vision.

25

But Glauce, seeing all that chaunced there, Well weeting how their errour to assoyle, Full glad of so good end, to them drew nere, And her salewd with seemely belaccoyle,6 Joyous to see her safe after long toyle. Then her besought, as she to her was deare, To graunt unto those warriours truce a whyle; Which yeelded, they their bevers7 up did reare, And shew’d themselves to her, such as indeed they were.

1

horrour: shuddering (from Latin). member: limb, with a double entendre on the male member, the penis.

5

2

6

3

7

4

late: recent. ywroke: avenged.

withstand: defend himself. salewd: saluted; belaccoyle: welcome, kindly greeting.

bevers: lower portions of the face-guards of helmets, with or without separate visors.

Canto Six

343

26

When Britomart with sharpe avizefull1 eye Beheld the lovely face of Artegall, Tempred with sternesse and stout majestie, She gan eftsoones it to her mind to call, To be the same which in her fathers hall Long since in that enchaunted glasse she saw.2 Therewith her wrathfull courage gan appall,3 And haughtie spirits meekely to adaw,4 That her enhaunced5 hand she downe can soft withdraw.

27

Yet she it forst to have againe upheld, As fayning choler,6 which was turn’d to cold: But ever when his visage she beheld, Her hand fell downe, and would no longer hold The wrathfull weapon gainst his countnance bold: But when in vaine to fight she oft assayd, She arm’d her tongue, and thought at him to scold; Nathlesse her tongue not to her will obayd, But brought forth speeches myld, when she would have missayd.7

28

But Scudamour now woxen inly glad, That all his gealous feare he false had found, And how that Hag8 his love abused had With breach of faith and loyaltie unsound, The which long time his grieved hart did wound, He thus bespake; “Certes Sir Artegall, I joy to see you lout so low on ground, And now become to live a Ladies thrall, That whylome in your minde wont to despise them all.”

29

Soone as she heard the name of Artegall, Her hart did leape, and all her hart-strings tremble, For sudden joy, and secret feare withall, And all her vitall powres with motion nimble, To succour it,9 themselves gan there assemble,

1

avizefull: considering. See III.ii.22–26. 3 appall: fail in strength. 4 adaw: be subdued; be daunted; be overawed. 5 enhaunced: raised. 2

6

choler: anger (literally bile, one of the four humors, associated with heat and thought to cause irascibility). 7 missayd: spoken harshly. 8 Hag: Ate; see i.47–54. 9 it: her heart.

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That by the swift recourse of flushing blood Right plaine appeard, though she it would dissemble, And fayned still her former angry mood, Thinking to hide the depth by troubling of the flood.1 30

When Glauce thus gan wisely all upknit;2 “Ye gentle Knights, whom fortune here hath brought, To be spectators of this uncouth fit, Which secret fate hath in this Ladie wrought, Against the course of kind,3 ne mervaile nought, Ne thenceforth feare the thing that hethertoo Hath troubled both your mindes with idle thought, Fearing least she your loves away should woo, Feared in vaine, sith meanes ye see there wants theretoo.4

31

“And you Sir Artegall, the salvage knight, Henceforth may not disdaine, that womans hand Hath conquered you anew in second fight: For whylome they have conquerd sea and land,5 And heaven it selfe, that nought may them withstand, Ne henceforth be rebellious unto love, That is the crowne of knighthood, and the band Of noble minds derived from above, Which being knit with vertue, never will remove.

32

“And you faire Ladie knight, my dearest Dame, Relent the rigour of your wrathfull will, Whose fire were better turn’d to other flame;

1

I.e., thinking to conceal the depth of the water (her powerful emotions) by stirring up the surface (her demeanor) so that it is no longer transparent. 2 all upknit: explain or summarize everything; bring everyone together. 3 Now that Britomart’s destined husband is aware that Britomart is female, Glauce seems to be apologizing for Britomart’s unladylike aggression by assuring the two men that this aggression was merely a “fit”—a sudden, transitory, and uncharacteristic activity. Alternatively, Glauce could be interpreted as saying that the men shouldn’t feel bad about having been conquered by a

woman since it was fate that, using the person of Britomart, wrought this ultimately beneficial marvel. Either way, Glauce is placating the egos of men who have been comically inept at penetrating Britomart’s body with their erect weapons. 4 “Don’t worry; she doesn’t have a penis, so another woman couldn’t possibly find her interesting.” 5 With this argument about female conquerors, Glauce becomes less placating to the men, while at the same time, Spenser becomes more complimentary to his queen.

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And wiping out remembrance of all ill, Graunt him your grace, but so that he fulfill The penance, which ye shall to him empart: For lovers heaven must passe by sorrowes hell.” Thereat full inly blushed Britomart; But Artegall close smyling joy’d in secret hart. 33

Yet durst he not make love1 so suddenly, Ne thinke th’affection of her hart to draw From one to other so quite contrary: Besides her modest countenance he saw So goodly grave, and full of princely aw, That it his ranging fancie did refraine, And looser thoughts to lawfull bounds withdraw; Whereby the passion grew more fierce and faine, Like to a stubborne steede whom strong hand would restraine.2

34

But Scudamour whose hart twixt doubtfull feare And feeble hope hung all this while suspence,3 Desiring of his Amoret to heare Some gladfull newes and sure intelligence,4 Her thus bespake; “But Sir5 without offence Mote I request you tydings of my love, My Amoret, sith you her freed fro thence, Where she captived long, great woes did prove; That where ye left, I may her seeke, as doth behove.”

35

To whom thus Britomart, “Certes Sir knight, What is of her become, or whether6 reft, I can not unto you aread a right. For from that time I from enchaunters theft Her freed, in which ye her all hopelesse left, I her preserv’d from perill and from feare,

1

make love: woo her (without connotations of sexual intercourse). 2 This image is influenced by the Phaedrus, in which Plato compares the soul to a charioteer (reason) who must try to coordinate a team of two mismatched horses: a noble one (spirit) and an unruly one (appetite). A man in love must learn to curb the impulses

of the unruly horse and force it to treat the beloved with reverence (Phaedrus, 246–56). 3 suspence: suspended; in suspense. 4 intelligence: news, report. 5 Sir: the title was occasionally applied to women, but Spenser never uses it for any woman who is not a knight. 6 whether: where.

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And evermore from villenie her kept: Ne ever was there wight to me more deare Then she, ne unto whom I more true love did beare.1 36

“Till on a day as through a desert wyld We travelled, both wearie of the way We did alight, and sate in shadow myld; Where fearelesse I to sleepe me downe did lay. But when as I did out of sleepe abray, I found her not, where I her left whyleare, But thought she wandred was, or gone astray. I cal’d her loud, I sought her farre and neare; But no where could her find, nor tydings of her heare.”

37

When Scudamour those heavie tydings heard, His hart was thrild with point of deadly feare; Ne in his face or bloud or life appeard, But senselesse stood, like to a mazed steare,2 That yet of mortall stroke the stound doth beare. Till Glauce thus; “Faire Sir, be nought dismayd With needelesse dread, till certaintie ye heare: For yet she may be safe though somewhat strayd; Its best to hope the best, though of the worst affrayd.”

38

Nathlesse he hardly of her chearefull speech Did comfort take, or in his troubled sight Shew’d change of better cheare: so sore a breach That sudden newes had made into his spright; Till Britomart him fairely thus behight;3 “Great cause of sorrow certes Sir ye have: But comfort take: for by this heavens light I vow, you dead or living not to leave, Till I her find, and wreake on him that her did reave.”4

1

In the chronology of the plot, Britomart is separated from Amoret before Britomart and Artegall reveal themselves to each other. In the order of the narrative, however, we read about Britomart’s and Artegall’s union before reading about Britomart and Amoret’s separation, as though the narrative pressure of the heterosexual union

effectively forces the female friendship apart. Britomart’s declaration of love for Amoret is crucially in the past tense. 2 mazed steare: stupefied steer (a powerful animal rendered powerless). 3 behight: held out hope. 4 reave: steal away.

Canto Six

39

Therewith he rested, and well pleased was. So peace being confirm’d amongst them all, They tooke their steeds, and forward thence did pas Unto some resting place, which mote befall,1 All being guided by Sir Artegall. Where goodly solace2 was unto them made, And dayly feasting both in bowre and hall, Untill that they their wounds well healed had, And wearie limmes recur’d after late usage bad.

40

In all which time, Sir Artegall made way Unto the love of noble Britomart, And with meeke service and much suit did lay Continuall siege unto her gentle hart, Which being whylome launcht3 with lovely dart, More eath was new impression to receive, How ever she her paynd with womanish art To hide her wound, that none might it perceive: Vaine is the art that seekes it selfe for to deceive.

41

So well he woo’d her, and so well he wrought4 her, With faire entreatie and sweet blandishment, That at the length unto a bay5 he brought her, So as she to his speeches was content To lend an eare, and softly to relent. At last through many vowes which forth he pour’d,

1 This is one of the few places where Spenser mentions a rest stop at a castle without describing and allegorizing the castle. 2 solace: entertainment; comfort. 3 launcht: lanced, pierced. At III.ii.26–27, the narrator describes Britomart as having been wounded by Cupid’s dart, which leaves her “sad, solemne, sowre, and full of fancies fraile.” At III.ii.39, Britomart describes herself as having swallowed a baited hook that has caused a festering, running sore in her entrails. Now that she has met Artegall, the narrator rewrites that earlier

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wounding as a lancing—i.e., caused either by a warrior’s lance or by a medical lancet. The word thus makes way for the idea that Britomart’s pain has been an unavoidable byproduct of an essentially beneficial process: the lancet’s releasing of infected matter from an abscess. That which caused her infection now cures it. 4 wrought: prepared, fashioned; worked upon; persuaded; made war upon. 5 unto a bay: to the point at which a hunted animal has no choice but to turn and face its pursuer.

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And many othes, she yeelded her consent To be his love, and take him for her Lord,1 Till they with mariage meet might finish that accord. 42

Tho when they had long time there taken rest, Sir Artegall, who all this while was bound Upon an hard adventure yet in quest,2 Fit time for him thence to depart it found, To follow that, which he did long propound; And unto her his congee3 came to take. But her therewith full sore displeasd he found, And loth to leave her late betrothed make,4 Her dearest love full loth so shortly to forsake.

43

Yet he with strong perswasions her asswaged, And wonne her will to suffer him depart; For which his faith with her he fast engaged, And thousand vowes from bottome of his hart, That all so soone as he by wit or art Could that atchieve, whereto he did aspire, He unto her would speedily revert: No longer space thereto he did desire, But till the horned moone three courses did expire.

44

With which she for the present was appeased, And yeelded leave,5 how ever malcontent She inly were, and in her mind displeased. So early in the morrow next he went Forth on his way, to which he was ybent. Ne wight him to attend, or way to guide, As whylome was the custome ancient Mongst Knights, when on adventures they did ride, Save that she algates him a while accompanide.

1

A knight takes a man of higher status as his lord in order to serve him militarily, but here, Britomart gives up knighthood in order to take Artegall as her lord in marriage. This marriage was the object of her knightly quest all along, yet that quest only

partly summarizes her experience of knighthood. 2 yet in quest: still uncompleted. 3 congee: farewell. 4 make: mate. 5 leave: permission to leave.

Canto Six

45

And by the way she sundry purpose1 found Of this or that, the time for to delay, And of the perils whereto he was bound, The feare whereof seem’d much her to affray: But all she did was but to weare out day. Full oftentimes she leave of him did take; And eft againe deviz’d some what to say, Which she forgot, whereby excuse to make:2 So loth she was his companie for to forsake.

46

At last when all her speeches she had spent, And new occasion fayld her more to find, She left him to his fortunes government, And backe returned with right heavie mind, To Scudamour, who she had left behind, With whom she went to seeke faire Amoret, Her second care, though in another kind; For vertues onely sake, which doth beget True love and faithfull friendship, she by her did set.3

47

Backe to that desert4 forrest they retyred, Where sorie Britomart had lost her late; There they her sought, and every where inquired, Where they might tydings get of her estate; Yet found they none. But by what haplesse fate, Or hard misfortune she was thence convayd, And stolne away from her beloved mate, Were long to tell; therefore I here will stay5 Untill another tyde,6 that I it finish may.

1

sundry purpose: various topics of conversation. 2 I.e., as a way of keeping him a bit longer, she told him she had something to say that had slipped her mind. 3 I.e., virtue, which begets true love and faithful friendship, makes Britomart care for

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Amoret. In what sense this true love and faithful friendship are “another kind” from the true love she feels for Artegall is a matter for interpretation. 4 desert: deserted; wild. 5 stay: stop. 6 tyde: time; occasion.

Canto Seven Amoret rapt1 by greedie lust Belphebe saves from dread, The Squire her loves, and being blam’d his dayes in dole2 doth lead.

1

Great God of love,3 that with thy cruell dart Doest conquer greatest conquerors on ground, And setst thy kingdome in the captive harts Of Kings and Keasars, to thy service bound, What glorie, or what guerdon hast thou found In feeble Ladies tyranning4 so sore; And adding anguish to the bitter wound, With which their lives thou lanchedst5 long afore, By heaping stormes of trouble on them daily more?

2

So whylome didst thou to faire Florimell; And so and so6 to noble Britomart: So doest thou now to her, of whom I tell, The lovely Amoret, whose gentle hart Thou martyrest with sorow and with smart, In salvage forrests, and in deserts wide, With Beares and Tygers taking heavie part, Withouten comfort, and withouten guide, That pittie is to heare the perils, which she tride.7

3

So soone as she with that brave Britonesse Had left that Turneyment for beauties prise, They travel’d long, that now for wearinesse, Both of the way, and warlike exercise, Both through a forest ryding did devise T’alight, and rest their wearie limbs awhile.

1

5

2

6

rapt: violently seized and carried away. dole: grief. 3 I.e., Cupid. 4 tyranning: tyrannizing.

lanchedst: lanced, pierced. so and so: likewise and likewise again. 7 tride: experienced; suffered.

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351

There heavie sleepe the eye-lids did surprise Of Britomart after long tedious toyle, That did her passed paines in quiet rest assoyle.1 4

The whiles faire Amoret, of nought affeard, Walkt through the wood, for pleasure, or for need;2 When suddenly behind her backe she heard One rushing forth out of the thickest weed,3 That ere she backe could turne to taken heed, Had unawares her snatched up from ground. Feebly she shriekt, but so feebly indeed, That Britomart heard not the shrilling sound, There where through weary travel she lay sleeping sound.

5

It was to weet a wilde and salvage man,4 Yet was no man, but onely like in shape, And eke in stature higher by a span,5 All overgrowne with haire, that could awhape6 An hardy hart, and his wide mouth did gape With huge great teeth, like to a tusked Bore:7 For he liv’d all on ravin8 and on rape Of men and beasts; and fed on fleshly gore, The signe whereof yet stain’d his bloudy lips afore.

6

His neather lip was not like man nor beast, But like a wide deepe poke, downe hanging low,9 In which he wont the relickes of his feast, And cruell spoyle, which he had spard, to stow: And over it his huge great nose did grow,

1

The narrator is backtracking to fill in the details of the experience that Britomart summarized at vi.35–36. 2 for need: to empty her bladder—or out of an unconscious desire to be raped (see Silberman 1995, 118; and Cavanagh, 145). In either case, in allegorical terms, her being alone in the woods indicates that she has let down her guard of chastity. As Cavanagh points out, however, the passage also asks us to evaluate what it is that makes Britomart fall asleep when she should be watching over Amoret (145).

3

weed: underbrush. man: identified by the Argument as Lust. 5 span: the distance from thumbtip to fingertip of a fully spread hand. 6 awhape: amaze; stupefy with fear. 7 Cf. the boar beneath Venus’ Mount in the Garden of Adonis (III.vi.48). 8 ravin: plunder; prey. 9 His form is that of the male genitals; the “poke” is the scrotum. 4 salvage

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Full dreadfully empurpled all with bloud;1 And downe both sides two wide long eares did glow, And raught downe to his waste, when up he stood, More great then th’eares of Elephants by Indus flood.2 7

His wast was with a wreath of yvie greene Engirt about, ne other garment wore:3 For all his haire was like a garment seene; And in his hand a tall young oake he bore,4 Whose knottie snags were sharpned all afore, And beath’d in fire for steele to be in sted.5 But whence he was, or of what wombe ybore, Of beasts, or of the earth, I have not red: But certes was with milke of Wolves and Tygres fed.

8

This ugly creature in his armes her snatcht, And through the forrest bore her quite away, With briers and bushes all to rent6 and scratcht; Ne care he had, ne pittie of the pray, Which many a knight had sought so many a day. He stayed not, but in his armes her bearing Ran, till he came to th’end of all his way, Unto his cave farre from all peoples hearing, And there he threw her in, nought feeling, ne nought fearing.7

9

For she deare Ladie all the way was dead, Whilest he in armes her bore; but when she felt Her selfe downe soust,8 she waked out of dread Streight into griefe, that her deare hart nigh swelt,9

1

His nose is like an erect penis. Indus flood: the waters of the Indus River, which flows through Pakistan. 3 A man sporting long hair and ivy signifies lust. 4 Oaks were emblematic of Druidism, an ancient Celtic religion that Spenser’s contemporaries associated with magic and torture. 5 I.e., heated in fire (to harden it) so it could serve in the place of steel. 6 all to rent: thoroughly torn. 2

7 Until the first line of stanza 9, the grammar of this line is ambiguous as to whether it is Lust or Amoret who neither feels nor fears. 8 soust: thumped; fallen. 9 swelt: swooned; perished—but with inevitable reference to an alternative meaning that is quite antithetical to the narrator’s insistence upon Amoret’s virtue: the verb could mean that her dear heart “burned with fever.” Cf. the passage in which Redcrosse succumbs to Duessa’s insidious charms and gives himself over to volup-

Canto Seven

353

And eft gan into tender teares to melt. Then when she lookt about, and nothing found But darknesse and dread horrour, where she dwelt, She almost fell againe into a swound, Ne wist whether above she were, or under ground. 10

With that she heard some one close by her side Sighing and sobbing sore, as if the paine Her tender hart in peeces would divide: Which she long listning, softly askt againe1 What mister wight it was that so did plaine?2 To whom thus aunswer’d was: “Ah wretched wight That seekes to know anothers griefe in vaine, Unweeting of thine owne like haplesse plight: Selfe to forget to mind another, is oversight.”

11

“Aye me” (said she) “where am I, or with whom? Emong the living, or emong the dead? What shall of me unhappy maid become?3 Shall death be th’end, or ought else worse, aread.” “Unhappy mayd” (then answerd she) “whose dread Untride, is lesse then when thou shalt it try: Death is to him, that wretched life doth lead, Both grace and gaine;4 but he in hell doth lie, That lives a loathed life, and wishing cannot die.

12

“This dismall day hath thee a caytive made, And vassall to the vilest wretch alive, Whose cursed usage and ungodly trade5 The heavens abhorre, and into darkenesse drive.

tuousness, “Till crudled cold his corage gan assayle, / And chearefull blood in fayntnes chill did melt, / Which like a fever fit through all his body swelt” (I.vii.6). 1 againe: in response. 2 mister: type of. After Amoret temporarily loses her sense of feeling and then all of her other senses (stanza 8.9–9.1), she also temporarily loses her name: for eight stanzas, she and the invisible woman beside her in the dark are designated only by interchangeable pronouns. One could argue that

they regain their names (in 18.9 and 19.1) through their mutual expressions of grief, by reading themselves in each other. (See Stephens, Limits, 41–5.) 3 I.e., “What shall become of me, an unhappy maid?” 4 I.e., to him who leads a wretched life, death is a grace and a gain. 5 usage: habits; trade: practice—though with a gesture toward sex for hire, the trade in human flesh.

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For on the spoile of women he doth live, Whose bodies chast, when ever in his powre He may them catch, unable to gainestrive,1 He with his shamefull lust doth first deflowre,2 And afterwards themselves doth cruelly devoure. 13

“Now twenty daies, by which the sonnes of men Divide their works, have past through heven sheene, Since I was brought into this dolefull den; During which space these sory eies have seen Seaven women by him slaine, and eaten clene. And now no more for him but I alone, And this old woman here remaining beene; Till thou cam’st hither to augment our mone,3 And of us three to morrow he will sure eate one.”

14

“Ah dreadfull tidings which thou doest declare,” (Quoth she) “of all that ever hath bene knowen: Full many great calamities and rare This feeble brest endured hath, but none Equall to this, where ever I have gone. But what are you, whom like unlucky lot Hath linckt with me in the same chaine attone?” “To tell” (quoth she) “that which ye see, needs not; A wofull wretched maid, of God and man forgot.

15

“But what I was, it irkes me to reherse;4 Daughter unto a Lord of high degree; That joyd in happy peace, till fates perverse With guilefull love did secretly agree, To overthrow my state and dignitie. It was my lot to love a gentle swaine, Yet was he but a Squire of low degree; Yet was he meet, unlesse mine eye did faine, By any Ladies side for Leman5 to have laine.

1

gainestrive: resist. deflowre: deprive of virginity by rape. Cf. Belphoebe’s flower of chastity (III.v.51–54). Cf. also another of the poem’s embodiments of unrestrained sexuality:

2

Cupid, who wreaks havoc in court, city, and country (III.vi.13–15). 3 mone: moan; sorrow. 4 reherse: relate. 5 Leman: lover, paramour.

Canto Seven

16

“But for his meannesse and disparagement,1 My Sire, who me too dearely well did love, Unto my choise by no meanes would assent, But often did my folly fowle2 reprove. Yet nothing could my fixed mind remove, But whether willed or nilled3 friend or foe, I me resolv’d the utmost end to prove,4 And rather then my love abandon so, Both sire, and friends, and all for ever to forgo.

17

“Thenceforth I sought by secret meanes to worke Time to my will,5 and from his wrathfull sight To hide th’intent, which in my heart did lurke, Till I thereto had all things ready dight. So on a day unweeting unto wight, I with that Squire agreede away to flit, And in a privy place, betwixt us hight, Within a grove appointed him to meete; To which I boldly came upon my feeble feete.

18

“But ah unhappy houre me thither brought: For in that place where I him thought to find, There was I found, contrary to my thought, Of this accursed Carle6 of hellish kind, The shame of men, and plague of womankind,7 Who trussing8 me, as Eagle doth his pray, Me hether brought with him, as swift as wind, Where yet untouched till this present day, I rest his wretched thrall, the sad AEmylia.”

1 meannesse: low rank; disparagement: the loss in status that she would incur from marrying him. 2 fowle: unfavorably; unfairly; harshly; grievously. 3 willed or nilled: agreeing or disagreeing. 4 I.e., to attain the ultimate goal (of marrying—or sleeping with—her beloved). 5 will: inclination; intent; pleasure; sexual desire; willfulness. There is a submerged pun on “will” as a slang term for the male

355

or female sexual organs (not in the OED, but see Booth, 466–67, for ample evidence from contemporary texts). 6 Carle: base fellow. 7 The strongly implied moral of her narrative is that she unwittingly found “in that place” exactly what she had set out to find—though Spenser’s representation of her is not confined to this moral. 8 trussing: a term from the sport of falconry, describing a falcon seizing its prey with its talons.

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

356 19

“Ah sad AEmylia” (then sayd Amoret,) “Thy ruefull plight I pitty as mine owne. But read to me, by what devise or wit, Hast thou in all this time, from him unknowne Thine honor sav’d, though into thraldome throwne.” “Through helpe” (quoth she) “of this old woman here I have so done, as she to me hath showne. For ever when he burnt in lustfull fire, She in my stead supplide his bestiall desire.”

20

Thus of their evils as they did discourse, And each did other much bewaile and mone; Loe where the villaine selfe,1 their sorrowes sourse, Came to the cave, and rolling thence the stone, Which wont to stop the mouth thereof, that none Might issue forth, came rudely rushing in, And spredding over all the flore alone, Gan dight him selfe unto his wonted sinne;2 Which ended, then his bloudy banket3 should beginne.

21

Which when as fearefull Amoret perceived, She staid not the utmost end4 thereof to try, But like a ghastly Gelt,5 whose wits are reaved, Ran forth in hast with hideous outcry, For horrour of his shamefull villany. But after her full lightly he uprose, And her pursu’d as fast as she did flie: Full fast she flies, and farre afore him goes, Ne feeles the thorns and thickets pricke her tender toes.

22

Nor hedge, nor ditch, nor hill, nor dale she staies,6 But overleapes them all, like Robucke light, And through the thickest makes her nighest waies; And evermore when with regardfull sight She looking backe, espies that griesly wight

1 2

selfe: himself.

Hamilton comments that “his act here suggests masturbation.” 3 banket: banquet. 4 end: Hamilton notes that in its allusion to Lust’s nose, the phrase “the utmost end” is

the first of several bawdy jokes in this stanza. 5 ghastly Gelt: horror-struck lunatic (from the Irish geilt). 6 staies: stops for.

Canto Seven

357

Approching nigh, she gins to mend her pace, And makes her feare a spur to hast her flight: More swift then Myrrh’ or Daphne1 in her race, Or any of the Thracian Nimphes2 in salvage chase. 23

Long so she fled, and so he follow’d long; Ne living aide for her on earth appeares, But if 3 the heavens helpe to redresse her wrong, Moved with pity of her plenteous teares. It fortuned Belphebe with her peares4 The woody Nimphs, and with that lovely boy,5 Was hunting then the Libbards6 and the Beares, In these wild woods, as was her wonted joy, To banish sloth, that oft doth noble mindes annoy.

24

It so befell, as oft it fals7 in chace, That each of them from other sundred were, And that same gentle Squire arriv’d in place, Where this same cursed caytive did appeare, Pursuing that faire Lady full of feare, And now he her quite overtaken had; And now he her away with him did beare Under his arme, as seeming wondrous glad, That by his grenning laughter mote farre off be rad.8

25

Which drery sight the gentle Squire espying, Doth hast to crosse him by the nearest way, Led with that wofull Ladies piteous crying, And him assailes with all the might he may, Yet will not he9 the lovely spoile downe lay,

1

For Myrrha and Daphne, see III.vii.26.1 and 4, notes. When Myrrha’s father discovered he had slept with his own daughter, he attempted to stab her, but she fled to Saba, in ancient southwestern Arabia (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 10.471–80). 2 Thracian Nimphes: the Maenads, Greek women whose inebriated and frenetic worship of Bacchus drove them to hack Orpheus into pieces when he refused to marry any of them after his beloved Euridice had died (Ovid, Metamorphoses,

11.1–66). Spenser may also have been thinking of the Thracian Amazons in Virgil’s Aeneid, 11.659–63. 3 But if: unless. 4 peares: peers, companions. 5 that lovely boy: Timias. 6 Libbards: leopards. 7 fals: happens; chances. 8 grenning: grinning; rad: read, perceived. 9 he: Lust.

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But with his craggy club in his right hand, Defends him selfe, and saves his gotten pray. Yet had it bene right hard him to withstand, But that he was full light and nimble on the land.1 26

Thereto the villaine used craft in fight; For ever when the Squire his javelin shooke, He held the Lady forth before him right, And with her body, as a buckler,2 broke The puissance of his intended stroke. And if it chaunst, (as needs it must in fight) Whilest he on him was greedy to be wroke,3 That any little blow on her did light, Then would he laugh aloud, and gather great delight.

27

Which subtill sleight did him4 encumber much, And made him oft, when he would strike, forbeare; For hardly could he come the carle to touch, But that he her must hurt, or hazard neare: Yet he his hand so carefully did beare, That at the last he did himselfe attaine,5 And therein left the pike head of his speare. A streame of coleblacke bloud6 thence gusht amaine, That all her silken garments did with bloud bestaine.

1

“Yet” in line 8 is more logical if we assign the pronouns in lines 8 and 9 thus: “Lust defended himself with his club, but it would have been difficult for Lust to withstand Timias, except that Lust was nimble on his feet.” The first line of stanza 26, however, suggests that we should reverse that pronoun assignment: “Lust defended himself with his club, and it would have been difficult for Timias to withstand him, except that Timias was nimble on his feet— because of which, Lust used craft” (to substitute for agility). By interpreting “But that” as meaning “Because,” Hamilton assigns the two pronouns to the same combatant, without specifying which one (Hamilton vii.25.9.n.). No matter what interpretation we give, the pronoun ambiguity is surely the point: Timias is temporarily difficult to distinguish from Lust.

2

buckler: small shield used to parry an opponent’s thrust. 3 wroke: revenged. 4 him: Timias, who is having trouble striking Lust for fear of inadvertently hurting Amoret, whom Lust has cleverly held in front of himself—but see note to 25.9. 5 The ambiguity of pronouns reaches its apex in this line, conveying the psychological and moral complexity of Timias’ position: he is fighting against a passion that is also resident in himself. In one sense of the line, Timias finally owns himself only when he stabs Lust. 6 It is difficult to tell here whether Lust or Æmylia is wounded, although stanza 35 will provide an answer. Throughout the poem, Spenser uses “coleblacke” only to convey the idea of moral or spiritual corruption;

Canto Seven

28

With that he threw her rudely on the flore,1 And laying both his hands upon his glave,2 With dreadfull strokes let drive at him so sore, That forst him flie abacke, himselfe to save: Yet he therewith so felly3 still did rave, That scarse the Squire his hand could once upreare, But for advantage ground unto him gave, Tracing and traversing,4 now here, now there; For bootlesse thing it was to think such blowes to beare.

29

Whilest thus in battell they embusied were, Belphebe raunging in that forrest wide, The hideous noise of their huge strokes did heare, And drew thereto, making her eare her guide. Whom when that theefe approching nigh espide, With bow in hand, and arrowes ready bent, He by his former combate would not bide,5 But fled away with ghastly dreriment, Well knowing her to be his deaths sole instrument.

30

Whom seeing flie, she speedily poursewed With winged feete, as nimble as the winde, And ever in her bow she ready shewed, The arrow, to his deadly marke desynde.6 As when Latonaes daughter cruell kynde, In vengement of her mothers great disgrace, With fell despight her cruell arrowes tynde Gainst wofull Niobes unhappy race, That all the gods did mone her miserable case.7

see I.i.24.9, I.iv.44.2, I.v.20.8, I.xi.44.8, and II.vii.3.8, as well as the black blood at I.xi.22.4 and V.xi.14.6. 1 flore: ground. 2 glave: glaive, a term used at different periods to describe three distinct weapons: lance, bill, and broadsword. Here it apparently refers to Lust’s club, unless he has a second weapon at hand. If the latter, Spenser’s customary archaism makes it impossible to know to which type of weapon he refers. 3 felly: cruelly.

4

359

Tracing and traversing: pursuing and turning aside. 5 I.e., when Lust saw Belphoebe approaching with her bow in her hand and her arrows aimed, Lust would not stay by Timias. 6 I.e., the arrow, meant for its deadly (or imminently dead) target. 7 Niobe told her Theban friends that she was more worthy to be worshipped than the goddess Latona, given that Latona had only two children to her fourteen. Enraged at hearing of this boast, Latona told her two children, Phoebus and Diana, to kill Niobe’s

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31

So well she sped her and so far she ventred, That ere unto his hellish den he raught, Even as he ready was there to have entred, She sent an arrow forth with mighty draught,1 That in the very dore him overcaught, And in his nape arriving, through it thrild His greedy throte, therewith in two distraught,2 That all his vitall spirites thereby spild, And all his hairy brest with gory bloud was fild.3

32

Whom when on ground she groveling saw to rowle, She ran in hast his life to have bereft: But ere she could him reach, the sinfull sowle Having his carrion corse quite sencelesse left, Was fled to hell, surcharg’d with spoile and theft. Yet over him she there long gazing stood, And oft admir’d4 his monstrous shape, and oft His mighty limbs, whilest all with filthy bloud The place there overflowne, seemd like a sodaine flood.

33

Thenceforth5 she past into his dreadfull den, Where nought but darkesome drerinesse she found, Ne creature saw, but hearkned now and then Some litle whispering, and soft groning sound. With that she askt, what ghosts there under ground Lay hid in horrour of eternall night? And bad them, if so be they were not bound, To come and shew themselves before the light, Now freed from feare and danger of that dismall wight.

34

Then forth the sad AEmylia issewed, Yet trembling every joynt through former feare; And after her the Hag, there with her mewed,6

fourteen children with arrows. Niobe turned to stone and wept unceasingly forever after (Ovid, Metamorphoses, 6.165–312). 1 draught: pulling of the bowstring. 2 distraught: split asunder. 3 fild: defiled. 4 admir’d: wondered or marveled at— though the modern sense of gazing with

pleasure and esteem had just begun to enter the language in Spenser’s time, and generations of British schoolboys have enjoyed applying that sense here. 5 Thenceforth: from there forward. 6 mewed: caged.

Canto Seven

361

A foule and lothsome creature did appeare; A leman fit for such a lover deare. That mov’d Belphebe her no lesse to hate, Then for to rue the others heavy cheare;1 Of whom she gan enquire of her estate. Who all to her at large,2 as hapned, did relate. 35

Thence she them brought toward the place, where late She left the gentle Squire with Amoret:3 There she him found by that new lovely mate,4 Who lay the whiles in swoune, full sadly set, From her faire eyes wiping the deawy wet, Which softly stild, and kissing them atweene,5 And handling soft the hurts, which she did get. For of that Carle she sorely bruz’d had beene, Als of his owne rash hand one wound was to be seene.6

36

Which when she7 saw, with sodaine glauncing eye, Her noble heart with sight thereof was fild With deepe disdaine, and great indignity, That in her wrath she thought them both8 have thrild, With that selfe arrow, which the Carle had kild: Yet held her wrathfull hand from vengeance sore, But drawing nigh, ere he her well beheld; “Is this the faith,” she said, and said no more, But turnd her face, and fled away for evermore.9

1

In the light of day, the old woman who saved Æmylia from being raped has now been transformed into a “hag,” a term of disgust. 2 at large: at length. 3 Amoret: Belphoebe’s twin sister, lest we forget. 4 mate: paramour. 5 stild: trickled down; atweene: i.e., between wiping her eyes and caring for her wounds. 6 Timias inadvertently wounded Amoret when Lust was using her as a human shield. In an allegory, however, supposedly nothing happens entirely by accident, so a second interpretation would be that despite

Timias’ originally noble intentions, his lust has led him to penetrate Amoret sexually. We must keep both of these situations simultaneously in mind—that the wounding was accidental and unavoidable, and that it resulted from Timias’ lust—if we are to understand the following stanzas. 7 she: Belphoebe. 8 both: the fact that Belphoebe’s wrath is directed not only at Timias but also at Amoret indicates that she believes Amoret’s deflowering to have been consensual. 9 Innumerable readers have noticed the evidence that this episode allegorizes a specific historical incident: in 1592, Sir Walter Raleigh impregnated Elizabeth Throckmorton, one of Queen Elizabeth’s maids of

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37

He seeing her depart, arose up light, Right sore agrieved at her sharpe reproofe, And follow’d fast: but when he came in sight, He durst not nigh approch, but kept aloofe, For dread of her displeasures utmost proofe.1 And evermore, when he did grace entreat, And framed speaches fit for his behoofe,2 Her mortall arrowes, she at him did threat, And forst him backe with fowle dishonor to retreat.

38

At last when long he follow’d had in vaine, Yet found no ease of griefe, nor hope of grace,3 Unto those woods he turned backe againe, Full of sad anguish, and in heavy case: And finding there fit solitary place For wofull wight, chose out a gloomy glade, Where hardly eye mote see bright heavens face, For mossy trees, which covered all with shade And sad melancholy: there he his cabin4 made.

39

His wonted warlike weapons all he broke, And threw away, with vow to use no more, Ne thenceforth ever strike in battell stroke, Ne ever word to speake to woman more;

honor, and then secretly married her. Queen Elizabeth had been mostly successful in keeping a tight rein on her maids of honor, who were supposed to be just that: honorable virgins. To deflower an aristocratic woman before marriage was to deprive her family and the Queen of a valuable political and financial playing piece. Indeed, all aristocrats, but especially those close to the crown, were wise to obtain the monarch’s tacit or explicit permission before marrying, an expectation that had developed over the centuries as a way of preventing aristocratic families from forming political alliances that could challenge the throne—and of giving the monarch temporary control over the estates of those aristocrats who were official Wards of the Court because they had inherited their estates while still under the age of 21.

Unlike her predecessors, however, Elizabeth had exercised her control over both male and female courtiers chiefly by denying their requests to marry. The handsome Raleigh had been one of the Queen’s favorites, but (or therefore) his betrayal of her trust infuriated her, and she banished him from court for five years. During his friend’s period of banishment, Spenser finished Books Four through Six of The Faerie Queene, including this episode, which portrays Belphoebe as sexually jealous and quick to pronounce judgment on Timias. 1 proofe: effect. 2 behoofe: benefit. 3 grace: favor or mercy (from Belphoebe). 4 cabin: hut; dwelling of a hermit; cell in a convent or prison; den of a wild beast.

Canto Seven

363

But in that wildernesse, of men forlore, And of the wicked world forgotten quight, His hard mishap in dolor to deplore, And wast his wretched daies in wofull plight; So on him selfe to wreake his follies1 owne despight. 40

And eke his garment, to be thereto meet, He wilfully did cut and shape anew; And his faire lockes, that wont with ointment sweet To be embaulm’d,2 and sweat out dainty dew, He let to grow and griesly to concrew,3 Uncomb’d, uncurl’d, and carelesly unshed;4 That in short time his face they overgrew, And over all his shoulders did dispred, That who he whilome was, uneath was to be red.5

41

There he continued in this carefull6 plight, Wretchedly wearing out his youthly yeares, Through wilfull penury7 consumed quight, That like a pined8 ghost he soone appeares. For other food then that wilde forrest beares, Ne other drinke there did he ever tast, Then running water, tempred with his teares, The more his weakened body so to wast: That out of all mens knowledge he was worne at last.

42

For on a day, by fortune as it fell, His owne deare Lord Prince Arthure came that way, Seeking adventures, where he mote heare tell;9 And as he through the wandring wood did stray, Having espide this Cabin far away, He to it drew, to weet who there did wonne;

1

follies: foolishness’; madness’; wickedness’; lewdness’. 2 embaulm’d: balmed, anointed. 3 concrew: become matted. 4 unshed: not parted. 5 Spenser objected to the Irish habit of wearing long hair that covered the face, making identification of malefactors difficult (View, 53). McCabe argues that

Belphoebe’s anger “transforms the civil English squire into a ‘wild’ Irishman” and observes that when Elizabeth sent Raleigh to Ireland in 1589, his position was seen by some as advancement, by others as punishment (McCabe, 18). 6 carefull: burdened with cares. 7 penury: starvation. 8 pined: wasted away with suffering. 9 I.e., wherever he heard of them.

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Weening therein some holy Hermit lay, That did resort1 of sinfull people shonne; Or else some woodman shrowded there from scorching sunne. 43

Arriving there, he found this wretched man, Spending his daies in dolour and despaire, And through long fasting woxen pale and wan, All overgrowen with rude and rugged haire; That albeit his owne deare Squire he were, Yet he him knew not, ne aviz’d at all, But like strange wight, whom he had seene no where, Saluting2 him, gan into speach to fall, And pitty much his plight, that liv’d like outcast thrall.

44

But to his speach he aunswered no whit, But stood still mute, as if he had beene dum, Ne signe of sence did shew, ne common wit, As one with griefe and anguishe overcum, And unto every thing did aunswere mum:3 And ever when the Prince unto him spake, He louted lowly, as did him becum, And humble homage did unto him make, Midst sorrow shewing joyous semblance for his sake.

45

At which his uncouth guise and usage quaint4 The Prince did wonder much, yet could not ghesse The cause of that his sorrowfull constraint; Yet weend by secret signes of manlinesse, Which close appeard in that rude brutishnesse, That he whilome some gentle swaine had beene, Traind up in feats of armes and knightlinesse; Which he observ’d, by that he him had seene To weld his naked sword, and try the edges keene.5

46

And eke by that he saw on every tree, How he the name of one engraven had, Which likly was his liefest love to be, For whom he now so sorely was bestad;

1

4

2

5

resort: habitual locations. Saluting: greeting. 3 mum: not a word.

usage quaint: strange behavior. Timias has been contemplating suicide.

Canto Seven

Which was by him “BELPHEBE” rightly rad. Yet who was that Belphebe, he ne wist; Yet saw he often how he wexed glad, When he it heard, and how the ground he kist, Wherein it written was, and how himselfe he blist:1 47

1

Tho when he long had marked his demeanor, And saw that all he said and did, was vaine, Ne ought mote make him change his wonted tenor, Ne ought mote ease or mitigate his paine, He left him there in languor to remaine, Till time for him should remedy provide, And him restore to former grace againe. Which for it is too long here to abide, I will deferre the end untill another tide.2

blist: blessed (by crossing himself); blasted (with presumably silent curses).

2

tide: opportunity; time.

365

Canto Eight The gentle Squire recovers grace, Sclaunder her guests doth staine: Corflambo chaseth Placidas,1 And is by Arthure slaine.

1

Well said the wiseman,2 now prov’d true by this, Which to this gentle Squire did happen late, That the displeasure of the mighty3 is Then death it selfe more dread and desperate. For naught the same may calme ne mitigate, Till time the tempest doe thereof delay4 With sufferaunce5 soft, which rigour can abate, And have the sterne remembrance wypt away Of bitter thoughts, which deepe therein infixed lay.

2

Like as it fell to this unhappy boy,6 Whose tender heart the faire Belphebe had, With one sterne looke so daunted, that no joy In all his life, which afterwards he lad, He ever tasted, but with penaunce sad And pensive sorrow pind and wore away, Ne ever laught, ne once shew’d countenance glad; But alwaies wept and wailed night and day, As blasted bloosme7 through heat doth languish and decay;

3

Till on a day,8 as in his wonted wise His doole he made, there chaunst a turtle Dove9 To come, where he his dolors did devise, That likewise late had lost her dearest love, Which losse her made like passion also prove.

1

Corflambo: heart (Latin cor) + flaming torch (French flambeau); Placidas: quiet, gentle (Latin). 2 wiseman: Solomon (in Prov. 16.14). 3 mighty: a term most often used of rulers. 4 delay: temper.

5

sufferaunce: uncomplaining endurance. unhappy boy: Timias. 7 bloosme: bloom. 8 on a day: one day. 9 Symbolizing true love. 6

366

Canto Eight

367

Who seeing his sad plight, her tender heart With deare compassion deeply did emmove, That she gan mone his undeserved smart, And with her dolefull accent beare with him a part.1 4

Shee sitting by him as on ground he lay, Her mournefull notes full piteously did frame, And thereof made a lamentable lay,2 So sensibly compyld,3 that in the same Him seemed oft he heard his owne right name. With that he forth would poure so plenteous teares, And beat his breast unworthy of such blame, And knocke his head, and rend his rugged4 heares, That could have perst the hearts of Tigres and of Beares.

5

Thus long this gentle bird to him did use, Withouten dread of perill to repaire Unto his wonne, and with her mournefull muse Him to recomfort in his greatest care, That much did ease his mourning and misfare: And every day for guerdon of her song, He part of his small feast to her would share; That at the last of all his woe and wrong Companion she became, and so continued long.

6

Upon a day as she him sate beside, By chance he certaine miniments5 forth drew, Which yet with him as relickes did abide Of all the bounty, which Belphebe threw On him, whilst goodly grace she did him shew: Amongst the rest a jewell rich he found, That was a Ruby6 of right perfect hew, Shap’d like a heart, yet bleeding of the wound, And with a litle golden chaine about it bound.

1

accent: sound; a part: a harmonizing musical part. 2 lamentable lay: lamenting song. 3 sensibly compyld: sensitively composed. 4

rugged: ragged.

5

miniments: proofs of Belphoebe’s past kindness shown to him and of his former (or present) rights to that kindness; literally documents, such as title deeds or charters, which provide evidence of certain rights or privileges. 6 Thought to affect the wearer’s erotic passions.

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7

The same he tooke, and with a riband1 new, In which his Ladies colours2 were, did bind About the turtles3 necke, that with the vew Did greatly solace his engrieved mind.4 All unawares5 the bird, when she did find Her selfe so deckt, her nimble wings displaid, And flew away, as lightly as the wind: Which sodaine accident6 him much dismaid, And looking after long, did marke7 which way she straid.

8

But when as long he looked had in vaine, Yet saw her forward still to make her flight, His weary eie returnd to him againe, Full of discomfort and disquiet plight, That both his juell he had lost so light, And eke his deare companion of his care. But that sweet bird departing, flew forth right Through the wide region of the wastfull8 aire, Untill she came where wonned his Belphebe faire.

9

There found she her (as then it did betide)9 Sitting in covert shade of arbors sweet, After late weary toile, which she had tride10 In salvage chase, to rest as seem’d her meet. There she alighting, fell before her feet, And gan to her her mournfull plaint to make, As was her wont, thinking to let her weet The great tormenting griefe, that for her sake Her gentle Squire through her displeasure did pertake.11

10

She her beholding with attentive eye, At length did marke12 about her purple brest That precious juell, which she formerly

1

riband: ribbon. colours: of her insignia or device. 3 turtles: turtle dove’s. 4 As well as enjoying books of printed emblems, sixteenth-century aristocrats enjoyed constructing living emblems or finding emblems in the world around them. 5 unawares: unknown to Timias; before he knew it. (Stanzas 8 and 9 indicate that the bird is aware.) 2

6 accident: occurrence; chance occurrence. 7 marke: take note of. 8 wastfull: empty; desolate. 9 betide: happen. 10 tride: undergone. 11 pertake: partake. 12 marke: notice.

Canto Eight

369

Had knowne right well with colourd ribbands drest: Therewith she rose in hast, and her addrest With ready hand it to have reft away. But the swift bird obayd not her behest,1 But swarv’d aside, and there againe did stay; She follow’d her, and thought againe it to assay. 11

And ever when she nigh approcht, the Dove Would flit a litle forward, and then stay, Till she drew neare, and then againe remove; So tempting her still to pursue the pray, And still from her escaping soft away: Till that at length into that forrest wide, She drew her far, and led with slow delay.2 In th’end she her unto that place did guide, Whereas that wofull man in languor did abide.

12

Eftsoones she flew unto his fearelesse hand, And there a piteous ditty new deviz’d, As if she would have made him understand, His sorrowes cause to be of her despis’d. Whom when she saw in wretched weedes disguiz’d, With heary glib3 deform’d, and meiger face, Like ghost late risen from his grave agryz’d,4 She knew him not, but pittied much his case, And wisht it were in her5 to doe him any grace.

13

He her beholding, at her feet downe fell, And kist the ground on which her sole did tread, And washt the same with water,6 which did well From his moist eies, and like two streames procead, Yet spake no word, whereby she might aread What mister wight he was, or what he ment,

1

behest: command. Cf. the doves in the stories of Noah’s flood (Gen. 8), Jesus’ baptism (Matt. 3.16–7), and Aeneas’ search for the golden bough that will enable him to visit his dead father in the underworld (Virgil, Aeneid, 6.183–204). Note that the dove is performing for Timias the same reconciling role that Spenser is attempting to perform for Raleigh. 2

3

glib: heavy, matted mass of hair worn over the eyes by the Irish; see vii.42.3.n. Unrequited lovers were stereotyped as ceasing to care for their appearance, wearing half-fastened clothing and untrimmed hair, but not as actually wearing glibs. 4 agryz’d: shuddering; horrified. 5 in her: in her power. 6 water: the Queen’s nickname for Sir Walter Raleigh was “Water.”

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But as one daunted with her presence dread,1 Onely few ruefull lookes unto her sent, As messengers of his true meaning and intent. 14

Yet nathemore his meaning she ared, But wondred much at his so selcouth2 case, And by his persons secret seemlyhed3 Well weend, that he had beene some man of place,4 Before misfortune did his hew deface: That being mov’d with ruth she thus bespake. “Ah wofull man, what heavens hard disgrace, Or wrath of cruell wight on thee ywrake?5 Or selfe disliked life6 doth thee thus wretched make?

15

“If heaven, then none may it redresse or blame, Sith to his7 powre we all are subject borne: If wrathfull wight, then fowle rebuke and shame Be theirs, that have so cruell thee forlorne;8 But if through inward griefe or wilfull scorne Of life it be, then better doe advise.9 For he whose daies in wilfull woe are worne, The grace of his Creator doth despise, That will not use his gifts for thanklesse nigardise.”10

16

When so he heard her say, eftsoones he brake His sodaine11 silence, which he long had pent, And sighing inly deepe, her thus bespake; “Then have they all12 themselves against me bent: For heaven, first author of my languishment, Envying my too great felicity, Did closely with a cruell one consent, To cloud my daies in dolefull misery, And make me loath this life, still longing for to die.

1

7

2

8

dread: dreaded; awe-inspiring. selcouth: seldom known; strange. 3 secret seemlyhed: disguised handsomeness, decency, or appropriateness. 4 of place: of a high social rank. 5 ywrake: wreaked. 6 selfe disliked life: a life that dislikes itself.

his: its (i.e., heaven’s); his (i.e., God’s). forlorne: abandoned. 9 I.e., then think better of it. 10 nigardise: niggardliness, stinginess. 11 sodaine: too hastily begun. 12 they all: all three of the reasons for his woe, as outlined by Belphoebe in stanzas 14 and 15.

Canto Eight

371

17

“Ne any but your selfe, ô dearest dred,1 Hath done this wrong, to wreake on worthlesse wight Your high displesure, through misdeeming2 bred: That when your pleasure is to deeme aright,3 Ye may redresse, and me restore to light.” Which sory words her mightie hart did mate4 With mild5 regard, to see his ruefull plight, That her inburning wrath she gan abate, And him receiv’d againe to former favours state.

18

In which he long time afterwards did lead An happie life with grace and good accord, Fearlesse of fortunes chaunge or envies dread, And eke all mindlesse of his owne deare Lord The noble Prince, who never heard one word Of tydings, what did unto him betide, Or what good fortune did to him afford, But through the endlesse world did wander wide, Him seeking evermore, yet no where him descride.6

19

Till on a day as through that wood he7 rode, He chaunst to come where those two Ladies late, Æmylia and Amoret abode, Both in full sad and sorrowfull estate; The one right feeble through the evill rate8 Of food, which in her duresse she had found: The other almost dead and desperate Through her late hurts, and through that haplesse wound, With which the Squire in her defence her sore astound.9

1

dearest dred: the speaker addresses the Queen with these words in I.Pr.4.9. 2 misdeeming: misunderstanding—or, less diplomatically, lack of perception. Kaplan argues that this word aligns the Queen with Lord Burghley and others who misread Spenser’s poetry because they “ill judge of love” (Pr.2.1; Kaplan, 44). These same people have “frosen hearts” (Pr.2.2). 3 I.e., whenever it pleases you to judge (me) correctly.

4

mate: join; checkmate; subdue; abash. I.e., his words do this to her heart. 5 mild: gentle; gracious (but with a hint of the meaning “not exuberant”). 6 We do not see Timias and Arthur together again until VI.v.11. 7 he: Arthur. 8 evill rate: poor amount or quality. 9 astound: stunned; amazed (by accidentally striking her).

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20

Whom when the Prince beheld, he gan to rew The evill case in which those Ladies lay; But most was moved at the piteous vew Of Amoret, so neare unto decay, That her great daunger did him much dismay. Eftsoones that pretious liquour1 forth he drew, Which he in store about him kept alway, And with few drops thereof did softly dew Her wounds, that unto strength restor’d her soone anew.

21

Tho when they both recovered were right well, He gan of them inquire, what evill guide Them thether brought, and how their harmes befell. To whom they told all, that did them betide, And how from thraldome vile they were untide Of that same wicked Carle, by Virgins hond;2 Whose bloudie corse they shew’d him there beside, And eke his cave, in which they both were bond: At which he wondred much, when all those signes he fond.

22

And evermore he greatly did desire To know, what Virgin did them thence unbind; And oft of them did earnestly inquire, Where was her won, and how he mote her find. But when as nought according to his mind He could outlearne,3 he them from ground did reare: No service lothsome to a gentle kind; And on his warlike beast them both did beare, Himselfe by them on foot, to succour them from feare.

23

So when that forrest they had passed well, A litle cotage farre away they spide, To which they drew, ere night upon them fell; And entring in, found none therein abide, But one old woman sitting there beside,

1

liquour: a not necessarily alcoholic, not necessarily potable liquid; Arthur carries a liquor that magically heals all wounds; see I.ix.19.

2

I.e., how they were untied, by the hand of a Virgin, from the vile imprisonment imposed by that previously mentioned wicked churl. 3 outlearne: find out.

Canto Eight

373

Upon the ground in ragged rude attyre, With filthy lockes about her scattered wide, Gnawing her nayles for felnesse and for yre, And there out sucking venime to her parts entyre.1 24

A foule and loathly creature sure2 in sight, And in conditions to be loath’d no lesse: For she was stuft with rancour and despight Up to the throat, that oft with bitternesse It forth would breake, and gush in great excesse, Pouring out streames of poyson and of gall Gainst all, that truth or vertue doe professe, Whom she with leasings3 lewdly did miscall, And wickedly backbite: Her name men Sclaunder4 call.

25

Her nature is all goodnesse to abuse, And causelesse5 crimes continually to frame, With which she guiltlesse persons may accuse, And steale away the crowne of their good name; Ne ever Knight so bold, ne ever Dame So chast and loyall liv’d, but she would strive With forged cause them falsely to defame; Ne ever thing so well was doen alive, But she with blame would blot, and of due praise deprive.6

26

Her words were not, as common words are ment, T’expresse the meaning of the inward mind, But noysome7 breath, and poysnous spirit sent From inward parts, with cancred malice lind,

1

parts entyre: inward parts (OED adj. 11). She sucks venom from herself and back into herself. 2 sure: surely. 3 leasings: lies. 4 Sclaunder: the spelling links the word with “scandal,” which, as Kaplan points out, may be true even while being malicious (13). 5

causelesse: having no basis in fact; unexplained (OED “cause” v14). 6 Kaplan argues that by inventing the character of Sclaunder, Spenser is addressing not

only the slanders about Raleigh and, in other contexts, about his own choice of love as a poetic theme, but also the common accusation that poets themselves were slanderers (29). Slander was a highly charged topic in Elizabethan society, where one’s good name was one’s most important possession, where the courts considered a bad reputation partial evidence of wrongdoing, and where slander was believed to be a source of civil disorder (Kaplan, 19, 26, 20). 7 noysome: stinking; noxious.

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And breathed forth with blast of bitter wind; Which passing through the eares, would pierce the hart, And wound the soule it selfe with griefe unkind: For like the stings of Aspes, that kill with smart, Her spightfull words did pricke, and wound the inner part. 27

Such was that Hag, unmeet to host such guests, Whom greatest Princes court would welcome fayne, But neede, that answers not to all requests, Bad them not looke for better entertayne;1 And eke that age despysed nicenesse2 vaine, Enur’d to hardnesse and to homely3 fare, Which them to warlike discipline did trayne, And manly limbs endur’d with litle care Against all hard mishaps and fortunelesse misfare.

28

Then all that evening welcommed with cold, And chearelesse hunger, they together spent; Yet found no fault, but that the Hag did scold And rayle at them with grudgefull discontent, For lodging there without her owne consent:4 Yet they endured all with patience milde, And unto rest themselves all onely5 lent, Regardlesse of that queane6 so base and vilde, To be unjustly blamd, and bitterly revilde.

29

Here well I weene, when as these rimes be red With misregard, that some rash witted wight, Whose looser7 thought will lightly be misled, These gentle Ladies will misdeeme too light, For thus conversing with this noble Knight;8 Sith now of dayes such temperance is rare

1

entertayne: treatment; reception. age: historical period; nicenesse: luxury; delicacy; fastidiousness. 3 homely: homelike; simple. 4 About travelers’ rights to lodging, see III.viii.52.5.n. 5 onely: i.e., only rest, since they could get no hospitality. 2

6

queane: badly behaved woman. looser: too loose; lewd. 8 conversing: associating; having sex with. The narrator intends the first, whereas the misreader believes the second. Misreading now becomes the prime example of slander, injurious not only to the poet’s characters but to the poet, who is himself misdeemed a scandalmonger (Kaplan, 38). 7

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375

And hard to finde, that heat of youthfull spright For ought will from his greedie pleasure spare, More hard for hungry steed t’abstaine from pleasant lare.1 30

But antique age2 yet in the infancie Of time, did live then like an innocent, In simple truth and blamelesse chastitie, Ne then of guile had made experiment, But voide of vile and treacherous intent, Held vertue for it selfe in soveraine3 awe: Then loyall love had royall regiment,4 And each unto his lust5 did make a lawe, From all forbidden things his liking to withdraw.

31

The Lyon there did with the Lambe consort,6 And eke the Dove sate by the Faulcons side, Ne each of other feared fraud or tort,7 But did in safe securitie abide, Withouten perill of the stronger pride: But when the world woxe old, it woxe warre old8

1

lare: pasture. antique age: stanzas 30 through 32 transform the early Middle Ages (the setting for this poem) into a Golden Age like that described by Greek and Roman writers, a period sometimes set in the future but usually set in the misty past when the world was supposedly a better place. See, e.g., Hesiod, Works and Days, 109–20; Virgil, Eclogue 4; Ovid, Metamorphoses, 1.89–112, Tasso, Aminta, 1 Chorus; and Guarini, Il Pastor Fido 4 Chorus. The degeneration of the world was an important theme for Spenser, who mentioned it at least once in each book of The Faerie Queene; cf. I.xii.14.8–9, II.vii.16–17, III.i.13, V.Pr. and passim, VI.xii.40–41, and Cantos of Mutabilitie passim. 3 soveraine: due to a ruler; supremely beneficial. 4 regiment: rule; self-control. 2

5 lust: desire or pleasure of any sort, but Spenser is also addressing a Renaissance debate over whether a perfect world would include marriage laws and restrictions and whether it would privilege pleasure. Cf. Chrysogone’s conceiving without pleasure and giving birth without pain (III.vi.27). 6 A much-repeated fantasy about the Golden Age, adapted from Isa. 11.6. 7 tort: injustice. 8 warre old: a false etymology for “world,” suggested by the Old English “worold.” Like many Renaissance scholars, Spenser experimented with the idea that words were inherently related to truths, rather than arbitrary signifiers. One could therefore use etymologies not only to prove something about a word’s historical meaning, but also to prove philosophical and other theorems. His and other scholars’ etymologies were often erroneous, but they can give us insight into Renaissance beliefs and needs.

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(Whereof it hight) and having shortly tride The traines of wit, in wickednesse woxe bold, And dared of all sinnes the secrets to unfold. 32

Then beautie, which was made to represent The great Creatours owne resemblance bright, Unto abuse of lawlesse lust was lent, And made the baite of bestiall delight: Then faire grew foule, and foule grew faire in sight, And that which wont to vanquish God and man, Was made the vassall of the victors might; Then did her glorious flowre wex dead and wan, Despisd and troden downe of all that overran.

33

And now it is so utterly decayd, That any bud thereof doth scarse remaine, But if 1 few plants preserv’d through heavenly ayd, In Princes Court doe hap to sprout againe, Dew’d with her drops of bountie Soveraine, Which from that goodly glorious flowre proceed, Sprung of the auncient stocke of Princes straine, Now th’onely remnant of that royall breed, Whose noble kind at first was sure2 of heavenly seed.

34

Tho soone as day discovered heavens face To sinfull men with darknes overdight,3 This gentle crew gan from their eye-lids chace The drowzie humour4 of the dampish night, And did themselves unto their journey dight. So forth they yode, and forward softly paced, That them to view had bene an uncouth sight; How all the way the Prince on footpace traced,5 The Ladies both on horse, together fast embraced.

35

Soone as they thence departed were afore, That shamefull Hag, the slaunder of her sexe, Them follow’d fast, and them reviled sore,

1

But if: unless. sure: surely. 3 overdight: covered overhead. 2

4

humour: state of mind (with a pun on “moisture”). 5 on footpace traced: traveled at a walking pace.

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377

Him calling theefe, them whores; that much did vexe His noble hart; thereto she did annexe1 False crimes and facts,2 such as they never ment, That those two Ladies much asham’d did wexe: The more did she pursue her lewd intent, And rayl’d3 and rag’d, till she had all her poyson spent. 36

At last when they were passed out of sight, Yet she did not her spightfull speach forbeare, But after them did barke, and still backbite, Though there were none her hatefull words to heare: Like as a curre doth felly bite and teare The stone, which passed straunger at him threw; So she them seeing past the reach of eare, Against the stones and trees did rayle anew, Till she had duld the sting, which in her tongs end grew.

37

They passing forth kept on their readie way, With easie steps so soft as foot could stryde, Both for great feeblesse, which did oft assay4 Faire Amoret, that scarcely she could ryde, And eke through heavie armes, which sore annoyd The Prince on foot,5 not wonted so to fare; Whose steadie hand was faine his steede to guyde, And all the way from trotting hard to spare,6 So was his toyle the more, the more that was his care.

38

At length they spide, where towards them with speed A Squire came gallopping, as he would flie, Bearing a litle Dwarfe before his steed, That all the way full loud for aide did crie, That seem’d his shrikes would rend the brasen7 skie: Whom after did a mightie man pursew,

1 2 3

annexe: add on. facts: evil deeds.

rayl’d: reviled. feeblesse: feebleness; assay: put to the test. 5 A medieval outfit of chain mail, helmet, shield, belt, sword, and spear could easily 4

weigh eighty pounds, and the metal was sweltering in summer, freezing in winter. 6 spare: refrain, spare himself and the horse. 7 brasen: brassy (in color, shine, or apparent hardness).

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Ryding upon a Dromedare1 on hie, Of stature huge, and horrible of hew,2 That would have maz’d a man his dreadfull face to vew. 39

For from his fearefull eyes two fierie beames, More sharpe then points of needles did proceede, Shooting forth farre away two flaming streames, Full of sad powre, that poysonous bale3 did breede To all, that on him lookt without good heed, And secretly his enemies did slay: Like as the Basiliske4 of serpents seede, From powrefull eyes close venim doth convay Into the lookers hart, and killeth farre away.

40

He all the way did rage at that same Squire, And after him full many threatnings threw, With curses vaine in his avengefull ire: But none of them (so fast away he flew) Him overtooke, before he came in vew.5 Where when he saw the Prince in armour bright, He cald to him aloud, his case to rew, And rescue him through succour of his might, From that his cruell foe, that him pursewd in sight.

41

Eftsoones the Prince tooke downe those Ladies twaine From loftie steede, and mounting in their stead Came to that Squire, yet trembling every vaine:6 Of whom he gan enquire his cause of dread; Who as he gan the same to him aread, Loe hard behind his backe his foe was prest,

1

Dromedare: dromedary, the onehumped domesticated camel, known for its speed. 2 Although at first this line seems to refer to the camel, the subsequent lines indicate that it refers to the rider. The camel, however, would also be horrible or at least ugly to English audiences, partly because it was so foreign and partly because it was associated with Muslims, whom Europeans had for centuries seen as the archenemy.

3 sad: grave; bale: evil; a consuming fire. Renaissance optics held that eyes emitted rays; this camel-rider’s eyes emit rays of fire. 4 Basiliske: a legendary dragon-like serpent with a lethal gaze. 5 The squire runs faster than the speed of sound. 6 I.e., to the squire, who was still trembling in every vein.

Canto Eight

379

With dreadfull weapon aymed at his head, That unto death had doen him unredrest,1 Had not the noble Prince his readie stroke represt. 42

Who thrusting boldly twixt him and the blow, The burden of the deadly brunt2 did beare Upon his shield, which lightly he did throw Over his head, before the harme came neare. Nathlesse it fell with so despiteous dreare3 And heavie sway, that hard unto his crowne The shield it drove, and did the covering reare,4 Therewith both Squire and dwarfe did tomble downe Unto the earth, and lay long while in senselesse swowne.

43

Whereat the Prince full wrath, his strong right hand In full avengement heaved up on hie, And stroke the Pagan with his steely brand5 So sore, that to his saddle bow6 thereby He bowed low, and so a while did lie: And sure had not his massie yron mace7 Betwixt him and his hurt bene happily, It would have cleft him to the girding place,8 Yet as it was, it did astonish9 him long space.

1 I.e., who would have killed him without hope of his being saved. 2 brunt: blow; physical shock. 3 despiteous dreare: contemptuous, malevolent, or violent direness. 4 reare: raise. Like Atlante in Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso (2.55–6, 8.11, 22.84–6), Arthur normally keeps his shield covered with a veil, since it strikes viewers blind and causes the sun and moon to feel sick in comparison to its brightness. Arthur uses the shield only when the odds are hugely in his opponent’s favor from the start, as when the opponent is a monster or an entire army (I.vii.33–34). Made of one perfect diamond, the shield has the magic power to cause all disguised or hypocritical opponents to turn into dust (I.vii.35). Here, the

“covering” comes at least partly off, yet it causes no harm to Arthur’s opponent. The “covering” may be interpreted as the shield itself, which covers the Squire and dwarf until knocked aside. Alternatively, the passage may be interpreted as meaning that only the Squire and dwarf see the uncovered part of the shield, which causes them to swoon in temporary blindness. 5 brand: sword. 6 saddle bow: the arched front and back portions of a saddle, curving to fit the horse’s back. 7 massie: weighty; mace: heavy club, usually metal, usually with a spiked head. 8 girding place: waist (about which belts are girded). 9 astonish: stupefy.

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44

But when he to himselfe returnd againe, All full of rage he gan to curse and sweare, And vow by Mahoune1 that he should be slaine. With that his murdrous mace he up did reare, That seemed nought the souse thereof could beare, And therewith smote at him with all his might. But ere that it to him approched neare, The royall child2 with readie quicke foresight, Did shun the proofe thereof and it avoyded light.

45

But ere his hand he could recure againe, To ward his bodie from the balefull stound, He smote at him with all his might and maine, So furiously, that ere he wist, he found

1

Mahoune: the camel-rider’s invocation of Mohammed, the highest prophet of Islam, identifies the rider as a Muslim. Since long before the bloodbath of the Crusades, Western Europeans had nursed the misconception that Muslims worshipped Mohammed or that Mohammed was the Muslim god, though in fact Muslims did not even consider Mohammed divine. In turn, Muslims thought of Europeans as worshipping multiple gods, out of a misconception about the unified being of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit (though of course Europeans did consider Jesus divine). Another Western European misconception centered upon the word “pagan,” which was defined by most scholars as designating those who did not worship the one true God, i.e., heathens. Thus theologians usually did not call Jews pagans. Nonetheless, they freely applied the term to Muslims, as Spenser does in stanza 43 above. Many of Spenser’s contemporaries would have been astonished to learn that Muslims worshipped the same god as Jews and Christians, venerated Abraham, Mary, and Jesus, and considered the Jewish and Christian scriptures part of “The Book” of God (albeit flawed by human transmission). Yet Islam had seriously encroached upon the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe

during the Middle Ages, spreading much faster than had Christianity in earlier centuries and meeting less resistance, partly because the policies of the Islamic conquerors toward those who did not convert were, for the most part, far more lenient than those of Christian conquerors (who tended to massacre entire villages first and ask questions later, and who treated many nonorthodox sects of Christians with more severity than did the Muslim invaders). For each side, then, the other became almost synonymous with evil. Yet Tasso and Ariosto both featured several Muslim characters in their epics, often making them complex and sympathetic characters. Spenser’s Muslim characters are usually nefarious, although he follows one standard literary formula in converting the Muslim woman into a member of Western European society. (For a discussion of such characters, see Kahf, 55–110.) Ironically, the European code of chivalry had originally come from Arab commanders such as Salah al-Din, whose chivalric manners on and off the battlefield had so impressed the Crusaders that they had composed many stories and poems of which “Saladin” was the dashing hero. 2 royall child: royal offspring, i.e., Arthur.

Canto Eight

381

His head before him tombling on the ground. The whiles his babling tongue did yet blaspheme And curse his God, that did him so confound;1 The whiles his life ran foorth in bloudie streame, His soule descended downe into the Stygian reame.2 46

Which when that Squire beheld, he woxe full glad To see his foe breath out his spright in vaine: But that same dwarfe right sorie seem’d and sad, And howld aloud to see his Lord there slaine, And rent his haire and scratcht his face for paine. Then gan the Prince at leasure to inquire Of all the accident,3 there hapned plaine, And what he was, whose eyes did flame with fire; All which was thus to him declared by that Squire.

47

“This mightie man” (quoth he) “whom you have slaine, Of an huge Geauntesse4 whylome was bred; And by his strength rule to himselfe did gaine Of many Nations into thraldome led, And mightie kingdomes of his force adred; Whom yet he conquer’d not by bloudie fight, Ne hostes of men with banners brode dispred, But by the powre of his infectious sight, With which he killed all, that came within his might.

48

“Ne was he ever vanquished afore, But ever vanquisht all, with whom he fought; Ne was there man so strong, but he downe bore, Ne woman yet so faire, but he her brought Unto his bay,5 and captived her thought. For most of strength and beautie his desire Was spoyle to make,6 and wast them unto nought, By casting secret flakes7 of lustfull fire From his false eyes, into their harts and parts entire.

1

confound: destroy; send to hell. Stygian reame: realm of the Greek underworld (bordered by the river Styx, adjectivally “Stygian”) or, by analogy, of hell. 3 accident: event. 4 Geauntesse: giantess. 2

5

bay: the point at which a hunted animal has no choice but to turn and face its pursuer. 6 I.e., his desire chiefly made strength and beauty into his booty. 7 flakes: sparks.

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49

“Therefore Corflambo1 was he cald aright, Though namelesse there his bodie now doth lie, Yet hath he left one daughter that is hight The faire Pœana;2 who seemes outwardly So faire, as ever yet saw living eie: And were her vertue like her beautie bright, She were as faire as any under skie. But ah she given is to vaine delight, And eke too loose of life, and eke of love too light.

50

“So as it fell there was a gentle Squire, That lov’d a Ladie of high parentage, But for3 his meane degree might not aspire To match so high, her friends with counsell sage, Dissuaded her from such a disparage.4 But she, whose hart to love was wholly lent, Out of his hands could not redeeme her gage,5 But firmely following her first intent, Resolv’d with him to wend, gainst all her friends consent.

51

“So twixt themselves they pointed6 time and place, To which when he according did repaire,7 An hard mishap and disaventrous case8 Him chaunst; in stead of his AEmylia faire This Gyants sonne, that lies there on the laire9 An headlesse heape, him unawares there caught, And all dismayd through mercilesse despaire,10 Him wretched thrall unto his dongeon brought, Where he remaines, of all unsuccour’d and unsought.

1

Corflambo: see Arg.3.n. for the etymology. Pœana: punishment (Latin). 3 for: because. 4 disparage: marriage to one of inferior rank; the disgrace resulting from such a marriage. 5 I.e., could not back out of the commitment; regarding gages as challenges, see iii.3.4.n. 6 pointed: appointed. 2

7

according: accordingly; repaire: go; retreat. 8 disaventrous case: unfortunate situation. 9 laire: pasture. 10 mercilesse despaire: the despair of the damned. Despair was the deadliest of the Seven Deadly Sins, because it meant that one had utterly given up hope of God’s help and was therefore completely separated from God. One who despaired, then, was beyond mercy.

Canto Eight

52

“This Gyants daughter came upon a day1 Unto the prison in her joyous glee,2 To view the thrals, which there in bondage lay: Amongst the rest she chaunced there to see This lovely swaine the Squire of low degree; To whom she did her liking lightly cast, And wooed him her paramour to bee: From day to day she woo’d and prayd him fast,3 And for his love him promist libertie at last.

53

“He though affide4 unto a former love, To whom his faith he firmely ment to hold, Yet seeing not how thence he mote remove,5 But by that meanes, which fortune did unfold, Her graunted love, but with affection cold To win her grace his libertie to get. Yet she him still detaines in captive hold, Fearing least if she should him freely set,6 He would her shortly leave, and former love forget.

54

“Yet so much favour she to him hath hight,7 Above the rest, that he sometimes may space8 And walke about her gardens of delight,9 Having a keeper still with him in place, Which keeper is this Dwarfe, her dearling base,10 To whom the keyes of every prison dore By her committed be, of speciall grace, And at his will may whom he list restore,11 And whom he list reserve,12 to be afflicted more.

1 Gyants daughter: Pœana; upon a day: one day. 2 glee: joy. 3 fast: earnestly; so as to bind him to her (thus to offset the liberty from prison that she offers him). 4 affide: affianced, betrothed. 5 remove: leave. 6 freely set: set free.

7

383

hight: pledged. space: ramble. 9 gardens of delight: the phrase suggests that she allows him to explore sexually as well as horticulturally. 10 dearling base: base-born or basely minded darling. 11 restore: i.e., to liberty. 12 reserve: keep (pent up). 8

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55

“Whereof when tydings came unto mine eare, Full inly sorie for1 the fervent zeale, Which I to him as to my soule did beare; I thether went where I did long conceale My selfe, till that the Dwarfe did me reveale, And told his Dame, her Squire of low degree Did secretly out of her prison steale; For me he did mistake2 that Squire to bee; For never two so like did living creature see.

56

“Then was I taken and before her brought, Who through the likenesse of my outward hew, Being likewise beguiled3 in her thought, Gan blame me much for being so untrew, To seeke by flight her fellowship t’eschew, That lov’d me deare, as dearest thing alive. Thence she commaunded me to prison new;4 Whereof I glad did not gainesay nor strive, But suffred that same Dwarfe me to her dongeon drive.

57

“There did I finde mine onely faithfull frend In heavy plight and sad perplexitie; Whereof I sorie, yet my selfe did bend, Him to recomfort with my companie. But him the more agreev’d I found thereby: For all his joy, he said, in that distresse Was mine and his Æmylias libertie. Æmylia well he lov’d, as I mote ghesse; Yet greater love to me then her he did professe.

58

“But I with better reason him aviz’d, And shew’d him how through error and mis-thought5 Of our like persons eath6 to be disguiz’d, Or his exchange, or freedome might be wrought. Whereto full loth was he, ne would for ought Consent, that I who stood all fearelesse free,

1

for: because of. mistake: mistakenly suppose. 3 beguiled: deluded. 4 new: anew. 2

5

mis-thought: i.e., others’ erroneous belief that he is his friend. 6 eath: easy.

Canto Eight

385

Should wilfully be into thraldome brought, Till fortune did perforce it so decree. Yet overrul’d at last, he did to me agree. 59

“The morrow next about the wonted howre, The Dwarfe cald at the doore of Amyas,1 To come forthwith unto his Ladies bowre. In steed of whom forth came I Placidas,2 And undiscerned, forth with him did pas. There with great joyance and with gladsome glee,3 Of faire Pœana I received was, And oft imbrast, as if that I were hee, And with kind words accoyd,4 vowing great love to mee.

60

“Which I, that was not bent to former love, As was my friend, that had her long refusd, Did well accept, as well it did behove, And to the present neede it5 wisely usd. My former hardnesse6 first I faire excusd; And after promist large amends to make. With such smooth termes her error I abusd, To my friends good, more then for mine owne sake, For whose sole libertie I love and life did stake.

61

“Thenceforth I found more favour at her hand, That to her Dwarfe, which had me in his charge, She bad to lighten my too heavie band,7 And graunt more scope to me to walke at large. So on a day as by the flowrie marge8 Of a fresh streame I with that Elfe did play, Finding no meanes how I might us enlarge,9 But if 10 that Dwarfe I could with me convay, I lightly snatcht him up, and with me bore away.

1

6

2

7

Amyas: friend (from ami, French). Placidas: see Arg.3.n. for etymology. 3 glee: entertainment; happiness. 4 accoyd: soothed, placated (after having suffered imprisonment). 5 it: her love; the whole situation.

hardnesse: standoffishness. band: chain, shackles, fetters; custody. 8 marge: margin, bank. 9 enlarge: set free. 10 But if: unless.

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62

“Thereat he shriekt aloud, that with his cry The Tyrant selfe came forth with yelling bray, And me pursew’d; but nathemore would I Forgoe the purchase of my gotten pray, But have perforce him hether brought away.” Thus as they talked, loe where nigh at hand Those Ladies two yet1 doubtfull through dismay In presence came, desirous t’understand Tydings of all, which there had hapned on the land.

63

Where soone as sad Æmylia did espie Her captive lovers friend, young Placidas; All mindlesse of her wonted modestie, She to him ran, and him with streight embras2 Enfolding said, “And lives yet Amyas?” “He lives” (quoth he) “and his Æmylia loves.” “Then lesse” (said she) “by all the woe I pas, With which my weaker patience fortune proves.3 But what mishap thus long him fro my selfe removes?”

64

Then gan he all this storie to renew,4 And tell the course of his captivitie; That her deare hart full deepely made to rew, And sigh full sore, to heare the miserie, In which so long he mercilesse5 did lie. Then after many teares and sorrowes spent, She deare besought the Prince6 of remedie: Who thereto did with readie will consent, And well perform’d, as shall appeare by his event.7

1

4

2

5

yet: still. embras: embrace. 3 I.e., then I attach less importance to all the woes I endure, with which Fortune tests my too-weak patience.

renew: retell. mercilesse: with no hope of mercy. 6 Prince: Arthur. 7 event: by his resulting action; by what happens to him.

Canto Nine The Squire of low degree releast Pœana1 takes to wife: Britomart fightes with many Knights, Prince Arthur stints their strife.

1

Hard is the doubt, and difficult to deeme, When all three kinds of love together meet, And doe dispart2 the hart with powre extreme, Whether shall weigh the balance downe; to weet3 The deare affection unto kindred sweet, Or raging fire of love to woman kind, Or zeale of friends combynd with vertues meet. But of them all the band of vertuous mind4 Me seemes the gentle hart should most assured bind.

2

For naturall affection5 soone doth cesse, And quenched is with Cupids greater flame: But faithfull friendship doth them both suppresse, And them with maystring discipline doth tame, Through thoughts aspyring to eternall fame. For as the soule doth rule the earthly masse, And all the service of the bodie frame, So love of soule doth love of bodie passe, No lesse then perfect gold surmounts the meanest brasse.

3

All which who list by tryall to assay, Shall in this storie find approved6 plaine; In which these Squires true friendship more did sway,

1

The squire of low degree loves, and intends to marry, Æmylia, but the only marriage mentioned in the canto is the one between Placidas and Pœana. Hamilton suggests that Spenser may intend this Argument’s pairing of the squire of low degree with Pœana as a witty comment on Pœana’s inability to tell the difference between the two men.

2 3

dispart: divide.

Whether: which (of the three types of love); to weet: to wit; that is. 4 I.e., the bond of friendship. 5 naturall affection: inborn affection for one’s kindred. 6 approved: proved.

387

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Then either care of parents could refraine, Or love of fairest Ladie could constraine. For though Pœana were as faire as morne, Yet did this trustie Squire1 with proud disdaine For his friends sake her offred favours scorne, And she her selfe her syre, of whom she was yborne. 4

Now after that Prince Arthur graunted had, To yeeld strong succour to that gentle swayne, Who now long time had lyen in prison sad, He gan advise how best he mote darrayne That enterprize, for greatest glories gayne. That headlesse tyrants tronke he reard from ground, And having ympt2 the head to it agayne, Upon his usuall beast3 it firmely bound, And made it so to ride, as it alive was found.

5

Then did he take that chaced Squire, and layd Before the ryder, as4 he captive were, And made his Dwarfe, though with unwilling ayd, To guide the beast, that did his maister beare, Till to his castle they approched neare. Whom when the watch, that kept continuall ward Saw comming home; all voide of doubtfull feare, He running downe, the gate to him unbard; Whom straight the Prince ensuing,5 in together far’d.

6

There he did find in her delitious boure The faire Pœana playing on a Rote,6 Complayning of her cruell Paramoure, And singing all her sorrow to the note, As she had learned readily by rote. That with the sweetnesse of her rare delight, The Prince halfe rapt, began on her to dote: Till better him bethinking of the right,7 He her unwares attacht,8 and captive held by might.

1

this trustie Squire: the phrase could refer either to Amyas or Placidas. 2 ympt: grafted (as one grafts a slip of one plant onto a branch of another). 3 I.e., the dromedary camel. 4 as: as though.

5

ensuing: following. Rote: a medieval musical instrument, probably related to the violin or lute. 6 7 8

the right: what was right. attacht: seized; arrested.

Canto Nine

7

Whence being forth produc’d, when she perceived Her owne deare sire, she cald to him for aide. But when of him no aunswere she received, But saw him sencelesse by the Squire upstaide,1 She weened well, that then she was betraide: Then gan she loudly cry, and weepe, and waile, And that same Squire of treason to upbraide. But all in vaine, her plaints might not prevaile,2 Ne none there was to reskue her, ne none to baile.3

8

Then tooke he that same Dwarfe, and him compeld To open unto him the prison dore, And forth to bring those thrals, which there he held. Thence forth were brought to him above a score4 Of Knights and Squires to him unknowne afore: All which he did from bitter bondage free, And unto former liberty restore. Amongst the rest, that Squire of low degree5 Came forth full weake and wan, not like him selfe to bee.

9

Whom soone as faire AEmylia beheld, And Placidas, they both unto him ran, And him embracing fast betwixt them held, Striving to comfort him all that they can, And kissing oft his visage pale and wan. That faire Pœana them beholding both, Gan both envy, and bitterly to ban;6 Through jealous passion weeping inly wroth, To see the sight perforce, that both her eyes were loth.

10

But when a while they had together beene, And diversly conferred of their case, She, though full oft she both of them had seene A sunder, yet not ever in one place, Began to doubt, when she them saw embrace, Which was the captive Squire she lov’d so deare,

1

4

2

5

upstaide: propped up. prevaile: succeed; profit her. 3 baile: post bail.

a score: twenty. I.e., Amyas. 6 ban: curse.

389

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Deceived through great likenesse of their face, For they so like in person did appeare, That she uneath discerned, whether whether weare.1 11

And eke the Prince, when as he them avized, Their like resemblaunce much admired2 there, And mazd how nature had so well disguized3 Her worke, and counterfet her selfe so nere, As if that by one patterne seene somewhere, She had them made a paragone4 to be, Or whether it through skill, or errour were. Thus gazing long, at them much wondred he, So did the other knights and Squires, which him did see.

12

Then gan they ransacke that same Castle strong, In which he found great store of hoorded threasure,5 The which that tyrant gathered had by wrong And tortious6 powre, without respect or measure. Upon all which the Briton Prince made seasure,7 And afterwards continu’d there a while, To rest him selfe, and solace in soft pleasure Those weaker Ladies after weary toile; To whom he did divide part of his purchast8 spoile.

13

And for more joy, that captive Lady faire The faire Pœana he enlarged9 free; And by the rest did set in sumptuous chaire, To feast and frollicke; nathemore would she Shew gladsome countenaunce nor pleasaunt glee: But grieved was for losse both of her sire, And eke of Lordship, with both land and fee:10 But most she touched was with griefe entire,11 For losse of her new love, the hope of her desire.

1

I.e., she could hardly tell which was which. 2

I.e., when he noticed their marked resemblance, he greatly wondered. 3 mazd: was bewildered about; was amazed at; disguized: decked out, though with overtones of trickery (cf. “counterfet” in line 4). 4 paragone: match.

5 6

hoorded threasure: hoarded treasure.

tortious: legally wrongful. seasure: seizure. 8 purchast: acquired by effort; in other contexts, the word could mean “acquired by money.” 9 enlarged: let loose. 10 fee: legal possessions. 11 entire: utter; sincere; inner. 7

Canto Nine

391

14

But her the Prince through his well wonted grace, To better termes of myldnesse did entreat, From that fowle rudenesse,1 which did her deface; And that same bitter corsive,2 which did eat Her tender heart, and made refraine from meat, He with good thewes3 and speaches well applyde, Did mollifie, and calme her raging heat. For though she were most faire, and goodly dyde,4 Yet she it all did mar with cruelty and pride.

15

And for to shut up all in friendly love, Sith love was first the ground5 of all her griefe, That trusty Squire he wisely well did move Not to despise that dame, which lov’d him liefe, Till he had made of her some better priefe, But to accept her to6 his wedded wife. Thereto he offred for to make him chiefe Of all her land and lordship during life: He yeelded, and her tooke; so stinted all their strife.

16

From that day forth in peace and joyous blis, They liv’d together long without debate,7 Ne private jarre,8 ne spite of enemis Could shake the safe assuraunce of their state. And she whom Nature did so faire create, That she mote match the fairest of her daies,9 Yet with lewd loves and lust intemperate Had it defaste; thenceforth reformd her waies, That all men much admyrde her change, and spake her praise.

1

This is one of those phrases that make one wonder whether an Elizabethan audience would have responded entirely differently from a modern one (the latter being likely to protest that a young woman whose father has just been murdered may be excused for being cool toward the murderer and his friends) or whether the author is asking us to be uncomfortable. 2 corsive: corrosive. 3 thewes: behavior, manners.

4

dyde: colored, complected. The phrase may mean that she has pink cheeks, or it may emphasize that she is not a dark-complected Muslim. 5 ground: basis; source. 6 to: as. 7 debate: argument. 8 jarre: discord. 9 I.e., so that she could compare with the fairest women of her day.

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17

Thus when the Prince had perfectly compylde1 These paires of friends in peace and setled rest, Him selfe, whose minde did travell as with chylde, Of his old love,2 conceav’d in secret brest, Resolved to pursue his former quest; And taking leave of all, with him did beare Faire Amoret, whom Fortune by bequest Had left in his protection whileare, Exchanged out of one into an other feare.3

18

Feare of her safety did her not constraine, For well she wist now in a mighty hond, Her person late in perill, did remaine, Who able was all daungers to withstond.4 But now in feare of shame she more did stond, Seeing her selfe all soly succourlesse, Left in the victors powre, like vassall bond; Whose will her weakenesse could no way represse, In case his burning lust should breake into excesse.

19

But cause of feare sure had she none at all Of him, who goodly learned had of yore5 The course of loose affection to forstall, And lawlesse lust to rule with reasons lore; That all the while he by his side her bore, She was as safe as in a Sanctuary; Thus many miles they two together wore,6 To seeke their loves dispersed diversly, Yet neither shewed to other their hearts privity.7

1 compylde: composed; sorted out; collected together. 2 travell: travail, labor; with chylde, / Of his old love: pregnant with his longtime beloved (Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, whom he has seen only in an erotic dream, described at I.ix.13–14). 3 For Amoret’s initial fear of Britomart, see i.5–8.

4 I.e., she knew well that she, who had lately been in peril, now remained in a mighty hand (a synecdoche for “abide with a mighty man”) who was able to withstand all dangers. 5

of yore: a long time before. wore: passed over gradually. 7 From here on in the poem, Amoret remains silent and invisible. Cf. Amoret and Britomart’s exchange of confidences at i.15–16. 6

Canto Nine

20

At length they came, whereas a troupe of Knights They saw together skirmishing, as seemed: Sixe they were all, all full of fell despight, But foure of them the battell best beseemed,1 That which of them was best, mote not be deemed. Those foure were they, from whom false Florimell By Braggadochio lately was redeemed. To weet, sterne Druon, and lewd Claribell,2 Love-lavish Blandamour, and lustfull Paridell.

21

Druons delight was all in single life, And unto Ladies love would lend no leasure: The more was Claribell enraged rife With fervent flames, and loved out of measure:3 So eke lov’d Blandamour, but yet at pleasure Would change his liking, and new Lemans prove: But Paridell of love did make no threasure,4 But lusted after all, that him did move. So diversly these foure disposed were to love.

22

But those two other which beside them stoode, Were Britomart, and gentle Scudamour, Who all the while beheld their wrathfull moode, And wondred at their impacable5 stoure, Whose like they never saw till that same houre: So dreadfull strokes each did at other drive, And laid on load with all their might and powre, As if that every dint the ghost6 would rive Out of their wretched corses, and their lives deprive.

23

As when Dan AEolus7 in great displeasure, For losse of his deare love by Neptune hent,8 Sends forth the winds out of his hidden threasure,

1

I.e., four of them were most fit for battle. Druon: cruel (from Latin durus, hard) or oak (from Greek δρυ ς); Claribell: famous in war (Latin clarus + bellum). 3 out of measure: immoderately. 4 threasure: treasure. 5 impacable: implacable. 2

6

393

ghost: soul. AEolus: a god who keeps the four winds pent up in his cave some of the time, letting them out when it pleases him. 8 hent: taken; seized. For a summary of the story of Neptune’s love for Æolus’s daughter, Arne, see III.xi.42. 7

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Upon the sea to wreake his fell intent; They breaking forth with rude unruliment,1 From all foure parts of heaven doe rage full sore, And tosse the deepes, and teare the firmament,2 And all the world confound with wide uprore, As if in stead thereof they Chaos would restore.3 24

Cause of their discord, and so fell debate, Was for the love of that same snowy maid,4 Whome they had lost in Turneyment of late, And seeking long, to weet which way she straid Met here together, where through lewd upbraide Of Ate and Duessa they fell out, And each one taking part in others aide, This cruell conflict raised thereabout, Whose dangerous successe depended yet5 in dout.

25

For sometimes Paridell and Blandamour The better had, and bet6 the others backe, Eftsoones the others did the field recoure,7 And on their foes did worke full cruell wracke: Yet neither would their fiendlike fury slacke, But evermore their malice did augment; Till that uneath they forced were for lacke Of breath, their raging rigour to relent, And rest themselves for to recover spirits spent.

26

There gan they change their sides, and new parts take; For Paridell did take to Druons side, For old despight, which now forth newly brake Gainst Blandamour, whom alwaies he envide:

1

unruliment: unruliness. firmament: sky. 3 The ordered earth supposedly came out of Chaos, a pit of disordered matter and energy. Cf. III.vi.36. 4 snowy maid: the Snowy Florimell. 5 successe: outcome; depended: hung; yet: still. This word is temporarily confusing, suggesting that we have returned to the present time—when Arthur and Amoret 2

are first seeing the six fighting knights from a distance—after a brief digression in stanza 24 has told us how the fight originally began. However, given that Scudamour and Britomart join the other four knights in stanza 28, it becomes clear that stanzas 25 through 31 continue the digression begun in stanza 24. We catch up with the present in stanza 32. 6 bet: beat. 7 recoure: recover.

Canto Nine

395

And Blandamour to Claribell relide.1 So all afresh gan former fight renew. As when two Barkes, this2 caried with the tide, That with the wind, contrary courses sew,3 If wind and tide doe change, their courses change anew. 27

Thenceforth they much more furiously gan fare, As if but then the battell had begonne, Ne helmets bright, ne hawberks strong did spare, That through the clifts the vermeil bloud out sponne,4 And all adowne their riven sides did ronne. Such mortall malice, wonder was to see In friends profest, and so great outrage donne: But sooth is said, and tride in each degree, Faint friends when they fall out, most cruell fomen5 bee.

28

Thus they long while continued in fight, Till Scudamour, and that same Briton maide, By fortune in that place did chance to light: Whom soone as they with wrathfull eie bewraide,6 They gan remember of the fowle upbraide, The which that Britonesse had to them donne, In that late Turney for the snowy maide; Where she had them both shamefully fordonne, And eke the famous prize of beauty from them wonne.

29

Eftsoones all burning with a fresh desire Of fell revenge, in their malicious mood They from them selves gan turne their furious ire, And cruell blades yet steeming with whot bloud, Against those two let drive, as they were wood:7 Who8 wondring much at that so sodaine fit,

1

6

2

7 wood: crazy. The dizzily shifting alliances

relide: rallied. Barkes: small ships; this . . . That: this one . . . That one. 3 contrary: opposing; sew: pursue. 4 I.e., through the clefts (in their armor), the vermilion blood spurted out. 5 fomen: foes.

bewraide: discovered.

and animosities make this episode like one of the more wonderfully absurd passages in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland or Through the Looking-Glass. 8 Who: Scudamour and Britomart.

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Yet nought dismayd, them stoutly well withstood; Ne yeelded foote, ne once abacke did flit,1 But being doubly smitten likewise doubly smit. 30

The warlike Dame was on her part assaid, Of 2 Claribell and Blandamour attone; And Paridell and Druon fiercely laid At Scudamour, both his professed fone.3 Foure charged4 two, and two surcharged one; Yet did those two them selves so bravely beare, That the other litle gained by the lone,5 But with their owne repayed duely weare, And usury6 withall: such gaine was gotten deare.

31

Full oftentimes did Britomart assay To speake to them, and some emparlance move;7 But they for nought their cruell hands would stay, Ne lend an eare to ought, that might behove, As when an eager mastiffe once doth prove The tast of bloud of some engored beast, No words may rate,8 nor rigour him remove From greedy hold of that his blouddy feast: So litle did they hearken to her sweet beheast.

32

Whom when the Briton Prince a farre beheld With ods of so unequall match opprest, His mighty heart with indignation sweld,

1

flit: swerved; gave ground. Of: by. 3 fone: foes. 4 Note the financial puns here and in the rest of the stanza. 5 lone: loan. 2

6

usury: interest. Still not understanding the needs of their own developing investment economy, Western Europeans decried all interest as usury, i.e., exorbitant interest. They longed for a past (largely fictional) in which loans were made from friend to friend without any demand for interest. That the sixteenth-century money-

lenders in Europe were often Jews, who were not allowed to own significant amounts of land and therefore had to amass property in other ways, added to the general prejudice against interest. These issues are relevant to a book in which the generous bonds of true friendship are aggressively contrasted with the supposedly uncivil habits of the Irish and the Muslims at the same time that present-day England is contrasted unfavorably with a more civil and less legally bound past. 7 I.e., and to propose some negotiation. 8 rate: chide.

Canto Nine

397

And inward grudge fild his heroicke brest: Eftsoones him selfe he to their aide addrest, And thrusting fierce into the thickest preace, Divided them, how ever loth to rest, And would them faine from battell to surceasse, With gentle words perswading them to friendly peace. 33

But they1 so farre from peace or patience were, That all at once at him gan fiercely flie, And lay on load, as they him downe would beare; Like to a storme, which hovers under skie Long here and there, and round about doth stie,2 At length breakes downe in raine, and haile, and sleet, First from one coast, till nought thereof be drie; And then another, till that likewise fleet;3 And so from side to side till all the world it weet.4

34

But now their forces greatly were decayd, The Prince yet being fresh untoucht afore; Who them with speaches milde gan first disswade From such foule outrage, and them long forbore: Till seeing them through suffrance hartned more,5 Him selfe he bent their furies to abate, And layd at them so sharpely and so sore, That shortly them compelled to retrate, And being brought in daunger, to relent too late.

35

But now his courage being throughly fired, He ment to make them know their follies prise,6 Had not those two him instantly desired7

1

they: Britomart’s and Scudamour’s virtues have not led us to believe that they could be included in this pronoun. Stanza 35 suggests that when Britomart and Scudamour ask Arthur to pardon the combatants, Arthur gives in because the request is made by the only two who abstained from unprovoked violence; however, stanza 35 is not entirely without ambiguity on that point.

2

stie: rise.

3 4 5

fleet: floods (literally “floats”). weet: wets.

I.e., until he saw that his patience was only encouraging them to keep on the offensive; until he saw that his talk had only allowed them time to recover strength to fight. 6 prise: price; reward (prize). 7 those two: Scudamour and Britomart; instantly desired: urgently requested.

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T’asswage his wrath, and pardon their mesprise.1 At whose request he gan him selfe advise To stay his hand, and of a truce to treat In milder tearmes, as list them to devise: Mongst which the cause of their so cruell heat He did them aske, who all that passed gan repeat;2 36

And told at large how that same errant Knight, To weet faire Britomart, them late had foyled In open turney, and by wrongfull fight Both of their publicke praise had them despoyled, And also of their private loves beguyled, Of two full hard to read the harder theft.3 But she that wrongfull challenge soone assoyled, And shew’d that she had not that Lady4 reft, (As they supposd) but her had to her liking left.

37

To whom the Prince thus goodly well replied; “Certes sir Knight,5 ye seemen much to blame, To rip up wrong, that battell once hath tried;6 Wherein the honor both of Armes ye shame, And eke the love of Ladies foule defame; To whom the world this franchise7 ever yeelded, That of their loves choise they might freedom clame,8 And in that right should by all knights be shielded: Gainst which me seemes this war ye wrongfully have wielded.”

1

their: presumably the other four, excluding Scudamour and Britomart, though there is a slight ambiguity; mesprise: mistake; offense; contempt; failure to recognize someone’s worth. 2 I.e., they began to relate everything that had happened. 3 I.e., it was difficult to say which was worse, her having stolen their public praise or her having stolen their private loves. 4 that Lady: the Snowy Florimell. 5 sir Knight: some scholars consider this an error for “sir Knights.”

6 I.e., you are to blame for raking up an unjust quarrel, given that you have proven yourself in battle. According to chivalric ideals, a knight was not supposed to fight civilians who were not trained in arms, except to defend himself or someone else whom the civilians had attacked. The ideal had been widely flouted. 7 franchise: freedom; privilege. 8 When Britomart sees six knights outside Malecasta’s castle trying to force Redcrosse to declare his love for their lady, Britomart scolds them by declaring that love may not be compelled (III.i.25).

Canto Nine

38

“And yet” (quoth she) “a greater wrong remaines: For I thereby my former love have lost, Whom seeking ever since with endlesse paines, Hath me much sorrow and much travell1 cost; Aye me to see that gentle maide so tost.”2 But Scudamour then sighing deepe, thus saide, “Certes her losse ought me to sorrow most, Whose right she is, where ever she be straide, Through many perils wonne, and many fortunes waide.3

39

“For from the first that I her love profest, Unto this houre, this present lucklesse howre, I never joyed happinesse nor rest, But thus turmoild from one to other stowre, I wast my life, and doe my daies devowre In wretched anguishe and incessant woe, Passing the measure of my feeble powre, That living thus, a wretch I and loving so, I neither can my love, ne yet my life forgo.”4

40

Then good sir Claribell him thus bespake, “Now were it not sir Scudamour to you, Dislikefull paine, so sad a taske to take, Mote we entreat you, sith this gentle crew Is now so well accorded all anew; That as we ride together on our way,

1

travell: travail, labor. At vi.36, Britomart describes looking for Amoret soon after losing her; at vi.38, she promises Scudamour to help him search for Amoret; and at vi.47, the two of them undertake that search. 3 waide: weighed. 4 Britomart declares her own pain but begins by mentioning a “wrong” that could apply either to her or to Amoret and ends by lamenting Amoret’s ill treatment; whereas Scudamour begins by mentioning his “right” in Amoret and, from then on, emphasizes his woes rather than hers. From his first appearance in the poem, he has 2

399

been prone to self-pity. One might expect Arthur to call Amoret forward here, so as to restore both Britomart and Scudamour to happiness, but he does not. Yet three stanzas into the following canto, Scudamour speaks of Amoret as though she is present. Upton speculates that Spenser meant to insert here, with a few changes, the five stanzas with which he ended the 1590 version of Book Three (Greenlaw, Variorum, 213). More recent scholars—e.g., Goldberg and Stephens—often take such lacunae as they come, analyzing them as registering ideas (intentional or otherwise on the part of the poet) about incompletion, loss of selfhood, superfluity, or absence.

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Ye will recount to us in order dew All that adventure, which ye did assay For that faire Ladies love: past perils well apay.”1 41

1

So gan the rest him likewise to require,2 But Britomart did him importune hard, To take on him that paine: whose great desire He glad to satisfie, him selfe prepar’d To tell through what misfortune he had far’d, In that atchievement, as to him befell. And all those daungers unto them declar’d, Which sith they cannot in this Canto well Comprised be, I will them in another tell.

apay: i.e., once they have passed, perils please and/or profit us (because we enjoy hearing stories of triumph over peril and/or

because we learn from hearing such stories). 2 require: request.

Canto Ten Scudamour doth his conquest tell, Of vertuous Amoret: Great Venus Temple is describ’d, And lovers life forth set.

1

“True he it said, what ever man it sayd, That love with gall and hony doth abound,1 But if the one be with the other wayd, For every dram2 of hony therein found, A pound of gall doth over it redound. That I too true by triall have approved: For since the day that first with deadly wound My heart was launcht,3 and learned to have loved, I never joyed howre, but still with care was moved.

2

1

“And yet such grace is given them4 from above, That all the cares and evill which they meet, May nought at all their setled mindes remove, But seeme gainst common sence to them most sweet; As bosting in their martyrdome unmeet.5 So all that ever yet I have endured, I count as naught, and tread downe under feet, Since of my love at length I rest assured, That to disloyalty she will not be allured.6

Scudamour is speaking. dram: one-sixteenth ounce in avoirdupois weight; one-eighth ounce in apothecaries’ weight (used for medicines, and in some forms sugars were considered medicinal). A pound was twelve ounces. 3 launcht: lanced. (See vi.40.5.n.) 4 them: lovers; suitors. 2

5 I.e., as though they were proud of their inappropriate martyrdom (inappropriate either because a man should not martyr himself abjectly to a woman or because no one should martyr him- or herself for a secular cause). 6 Not even by torture, as in the House of Busirane.

401

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3

“Long were to tell the travell1 and long toile, Through which this shield of love I late have wonne, And purchased this peerelesse beauties spoile,2 That3 harder may be ended, then begonne. But since ye so desire, your will be donne. Then hearke ye gentle knights and Ladies free,4 My hard mishaps, that ye may learne to shonne; For though sweet love to conquer glorious bee, Yet is the paine thereof much greater then the fee.5

4

“What time the fame of this renowmed prise6 Flew first abroad, and all mens eares possest, I having armes then taken,7 gan avise To winne me honour by some noble gest, And purchase me some place amongst the best.8 I boldly thought (so young mens thoughts are bold) That this same brave emprize for me did rest, And that both shield and she whom I behold, Might be my lucky lot; sith all by lot we hold.

5

“So on that hard adventure forth I went, And to the place of perill shortly came. That was a temple faire and auncient, Which of great mother Venus bare the name, And farre renowmed through exceeding fame; Much more then that, which was in Paphos built, Or that in Cyprus,9 both long since this same, Though all the pillours of the one were guilt,10 And all the others pavement were with yvory spilt.11

1

travell: toil; labor in childbirth; journeying. 2 spoile: a word usually used to describe goods or women seized in battle. Scudamour seems to be referring to a now-present Amoret. (See ix.39.9.n.) 3

That: his narration of his experience; his experience. 4 free: of high birth; not captive. 5 fee: reward. He seems to be forgetting that he has just declared that his possession of Amoret has made the toil seem insignificant. Frustrated Petrarchan lovers are, of course, typified by swings in mood, but

given that this particular lover now has his prize, his pessimism is odd. 6 I.e., Amoret. 7 I.e., having taken the vows of a knight, swearing to be loyal to his lord and to aid the defenseless. 8 These were the admirable goals of every knight; it was not considered unseemly to declare one’s intention to acquire fame. 9 Paphos . . . Cyprus: locations of two famous ancient temples to Venus. 10 guilt: gilt, gilded with gold. 11 spilt: overlaid or covered, in this case perhaps with ivory mosaic (OED “spill” v. 12.a).

Canto Ten

6

“And it was seated in an Island strong, Abounding all with delices1 most rare, And wall’d by nature gainst invaders wrong, That none mote have accesse, nor inward fare, But by one way, that passage did prepare. It was a bridge ybuilt in goodly wize, With curious Corbes and pendants2 graven faire, And arched all with porches, did arize On stately pillours, fram’d after the Doricke guize.3

7

“And for defence thereof, on th’other end There reared was a castle faire and strong, That warded4 all which in or out did wend, And flancked both the bridges sides along, Gainst all that would it faine to force or wrong. And therein wonned twenty valiant Knights; All twenty tride in warres experience long; Whose office was, against all manner wights By all meanes to maintaine, that castels ancient rights.

8

“Before that Castle was an open plaine, And in the midst thereof a piller placed; On which this shield, of many sought in vaine, The shield of Love, whose guerdon me hath graced, Was hangd on high with golden ribbands laced; And in the marble stone was written this, With golden letters goodly well enchaced, Blessed the man that well can use his blis: Whose ever be the shield, faire Amoret be his.

9

“Which when I red, my heart did inly earne,5 And pant with hope of that adventures hap:6 Ne stayed further newes thereof to learne,

1

delices: voluptuous delights; delicacies. curious Corbes: intricately wrought corbels, projections of stone, brick, or wood jutting out from a wall in order to support other architectural elements; pendants: stone or wooden decorative knobs hanging from stems; posts set close against the wall, resting on the corbels or supporting them. 3 Doricke guize: in the manner of Doric architecture, the simplest, strongest, and 2

403

most massive of the four ancient Greek styles (which also included Ionic, Æolian, and Corinthian). In the late sixteenth century, interest in copying Greek style was beginning to develop in England, following the earlier Italian interest. 4 warded: guarded. 5 earne: yearn. 6 hap: good fortune.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Four

But with my speare upon the shield did rap,1 That all the castle ringed with the clap. Streight forth issewd a Knight all arm’d to proofe,2 And bravely mounted to his most mishap:3 Who staying nought to question from aloofe, Ran fierce at me, that fire glaunst from his horses hoofe. 10

“Whom boldly I encountred (as I could)4 And by good fortune shortly him unseated. Eftsoones out sprung two more of equall mould;5 But I them both with equall hap defeated: So all the twenty I likewise entreated,6 And left them groning there upon the plaine. Then preacing7 to the pillour I repeated The read8 thereof for guerdon of my paine, And taking downe the shield, with me did it retaine.

11

“So forth without impediment9 I past, Till to the Bridges utter10 gate I came: The which I found sure lockt and chained fast. I knockt, but no man aunswred me by name; I cald, but no man answerd to my clame.11 Yet I persever’d still to knocke and call, Till at the last I spide within the same, Where one stood peeping through a crevis12 small, To whom I cald aloud, halfe angry therewithall.

1

Upton explains that it was a custom in some tournaments—or at least in literary descriptions of tournaments—to hang up a shield for each knight to rap as a symbolic demonstration of his issuing a challenge (Greenlaw, Variorum, 220). 2 to proofe: to the point of being impenetrable. 3 I.e., mounted well enough to withstand the greatest misfortune. 4 I.e., as well as I could. 5 mould: stature; quality. 6 entreated: treated.

7

preacing: pressing. read: inscription. 9 without impediment: in the approved marriage ceremony, at one point the priest was required to ask the congregation whether anyone present knew of any impediment to the couple’s becoming lawfully married. 10 utter: outermost. 11 clame: shout (OED “claim” sb. 4); claim. 12 crevis: crevice. 8

Canto Ten

12

“That was to weet the Porter of the place, Unto whose trust the charge thereof was lent: His name was Doubt, that had a double face, Th’one forward looking, th’other backeward bent, Therein resembling Janus1 auncient, Which hath in charge the ingate of the yeare: And evermore his eyes about him went, As if some proved perill he did feare, Or did misdoubt some ill, whose cause did not appeare.

13

“On th’one side he, on th’other sate Delay, Behinde the gate, that none her might espy; Whose manner was all passengers2 to stay, And entertaine with her occasions3 sly, Through which some lost great hope unheedily,4 Which never they recover might againe; And others quite excluded forth,5 did ly Long languishing there in unpittied paine, And seeking often entraunce, afterwards in vaine.

14

“Me when as he had privily6 espide, Bearing the shield which I had conquerd late, He kend7 it streight, and to me opened wide. So in I past, and streight he closd the gate. But being in, Delay in close awaite8 Caught hold on me, and thought my steps to stay, Feigning full many a fond excuse to prate,9 And time to steale, the threasure of mans day, Whose smallest minute10 lost, no riches render may.

15

“But by no meanes my way I would forslow,11 For ought that ever she could doe or say, But from my lofty steede dismounting low,

1

Janus: Roman god of gateways and beginnings; he had two faces, looking in opposite directions. Cf. “January.” 2 passengers: passers-by. 3 occasions: pretexts. 4 unheedily: heedlessly; unheeding. 5 forth: from going onward. 6 privily: stealthily.

7

405

kend: recognized. awaite: ambush. 9 prate: prattle. 10 The OED gives the earliest use of the word “second” to record a unit of time as 1588, so minutes were still widely thought of as the smallest units of time in 1596. 11 forslow: slacken. 8

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The Faerie Queene: Book Four

Past forth on foote, beholding all the way The goodly workes, and stones of rich assay,1 Cast into sundry shapes by wondrous skill, That like on earth no where I recken may: And underneath, the river rolling still With murmure soft, that seem’d to serve the workmans will. 16

“Thence forth2 I passed to the second gate, The Gate of good desert, whose goodly pride And costly frame, were long here to relate. The same to all stoode alwaies open wide: But in the Porch did evermore abide An hideous3 Giant, dreadfull to behold, That stopt the entraunce with his spacious stride,4 And with the terrour of his countenance bold Full many did affray, that else faine enter would.

17

“His name was Daunger5 dreaded over all, Who day and night did watch and duely ward, From fearefull cowards, entrance to forstall, And faint-heart-fooles, whom shew of perill hard Could terrifie from Fortunes faire adward:6 For oftentimes faint hearts at first espiall7 Of his grim face, were from approaching scard; Unworthy they of grace, whom one deniall Excludes from fairest hope, withouten further triall.

18

“Yet many doughty warriours, often tride In greater perils to be stout and bold, Durst not the sternnesse of his looke abide, But soone as they his countenance did behold, Began to faint, and feele their corage cold. Againe some other, that in hard assaies Were cowards knowne, and litle count did hold,8 Either through gifts, or guile, or such like waies, Crept in by stouping low, or stealing of the kaies.9

1

assay: tested worth. Thence forth: from that place. 3 hideous: frightful; monstrously large. 4 spacious stride: wide straddling stance. 5 Daunger: a standoffish attitude or behav2

ior from one being wooed, often a component of especially teasing or cruel flirtation. 6 adward: award. 7 espiall: glimpse. 8 I.e., had low reputations. 9 kaies: keys.

Canto Ten

19

“But I though meanest1 man of many moe, Yet much disdaining unto him to lout, Or creepe betweene his legs, so in to goe, Resolv’d him to assault with manhood stout, And either beat him in, or drive him out. Eftsoones advauncing that enchaunted shield, With all my might I gan to lay about: Which when he saw, the glaive2 which he did wield He gan forthwith t’avale,3 and way unto me yield.

20

“So as I entred, I did backeward looke, For feare of harme, that might lie hidden there; And loe his hindparts, whereof heed I tooke, Much more deformed fearefull ugly were, Then all his former parts did earst appere. For hatred, murther, treason, and despight, With many moe lay in ambushment there,4 Awayting to entrap the warelesse wight, Which did not them prevent with vigilant foresight.

21

“Thus having past all perill, I was come Within the compasse of that Islands space; The which did seeme unto my simple doome,5 The onely pleasant and delightfull place, That ever troden was of footings trace. For all that nature by her mother wit6 Could frame7 in earth, and forme of substance base, Was there, and all that nature did omit, Art playing second natures part,8 supplyed it.

1

1609 edition; the 1596 edition has “nearest.” The handwritten words are easy to confuse, but it is worth considering the possibility that instead of denigrating himself, Scudamour is saying that even though he was closest to the intimidating giant, he did not bow. 2 glaive: a term used at different periods to describe three distinct weapons: lance, bill, and broadsword. Given his deliberate archaism, Spenser could mean any of the three. 3 avale: lower.

4

407

Presumably they have been hiding behind the giant; the alternative of their actually being part of his “hindparts” is mind-boggling, but just possible. 5 doome: judgment. 6 mother wit: inherent powers. 7 frame: construct. 8 Spenser’s friend Sidney argued that whereas nature created only a brass world, poets used fiction to create a golden one (Sidney, Defence, 100).

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The Faerie Queene: Book Four

22

“No tree, that is of count, in greenewood growes,1 From lowest Juniper to Ceder tall, No flowre in field, that daintie odour throwes, And deckes his branch with blossomes over all, But there was planted, or grew naturall: Nor sense of man so coy and curious nice,2 But there mote find to please it selfe withall; Nor hart could wish for any queint device,3 But there it present was, and did fraile sense entice.

23

“In such luxurious plentie of all pleasure, It seem’d a second paradise to ghesse,4 So lavishly enricht with natures threasure, That if the happie soules, which doe possesse Th’Elysian fields,5 and live in lasting blesse, Should happen this with living eye to see, They soone would loath their lesser happinesse, And wish to life return’d againe to bee, That in this joyous place they mote have joyance6 free.

24

“Fresh shadowes, fit to shroud from sunny ray; Faire lawnds,7 to take the sunne in season dew; Sweet springs, in which a thousand Nymphs did play; Soft rombling8 brookes, that gentle slomber drew; High reared mounts, the lands about to vew; Low looking dales, disloignd9 from common gaze; Delightfull bowres, to solace lovers trew; False Labyrinthes,10 fond runners eyes to daze; All which by nature made did nature selfe amaze.11

1

of count: of importance; in greenewood growes: in greenwood groves; that grows in any greenwood. 2 coy: reserved; curious nice: fastidious about details; wonderfully fastidious. 3 queint device: ingeniously wrought design or art object. 4 to ghesse: as one might guess (reiterates and intensifies “seem’d”). 5 Th’Elysian fields: Elysium––in Greek mythology, the home of fortunate people after death.

6

joyance: pleasure. lawnds: glades, open spaces among woods. 8 rombling: rumbling, murmuring. 9 disloignd: remote. 10 Labyrinthes: hedge mazes often constructed in Elizabethan gardens. 11 Cf. the trees in the Garden of Adonis that are wild but train themselves into an arbor atop Venus’ Mount (III.vi.44). 7

Canto Ten

25

“And all without were walkes and alleyes1 dight, With divers trees, enrang’d in even rankes; And here and there were pleasant arbors pight,2 And shadie seates, and sundry flowring bankes, To sit and rest the walkers wearie shankes, And therein thousand payres of lovers walkt, Praysing their god, and yeelding him great thankes, Ne ever ought but of their true loves talkt, Ne ever for rebuke or blame of any balkt.3

26

“All these together by themselves did sport Their spotlesse pleasures, and sweet loves content. But farre away from these, another sort4 Of lovers lincked in true harts consent; Which loved not as these, for like intent, But on chast vertue grounded their desire, Farre from all fraud, or fayned blandishment; Which in their spirits kindling zealous fire, Brave thoughts and noble deedes did evermore aspire.

27

“Such were great Hercules, and Hyllus5 deare; Trew Jonathan, and David 6 trustie tryde; Stout Theseus, and Pirithous his feare;7 Pylades and Orestes8 by his syde; Myld Titus and Gesippus without pryde;9 Damon and Pythias whom death could not sever:10

1 alleyes: walks or long greens bordered by trees, hedges, or beds of flowers. 2 pight: placed; set up. 3 balkt: quit conversing; i.e., they didn’t have to worry about rumors or slander. 4 sort: group. 5 Hyllus: Hyllus was Hercules’ son; Spenser likely means “Hylas,” a boy whom Hercules loved. (See III.xii.7.5–9.) 6 For David, see ii.2.1–4 and notes. Jonathan was Saul’s son; he loved David as though David were himself, and he saved David from being murdered by Saul (1 Sam. 18–20). 7 feare: fere, companion. Theseus helped Pirithous fight against the Centaurs; later he helped him abduct Proserpina from Hades.

409

8 Pylades was Orestes’ friend who fought beside him on numerous occasions and risked death for his sake. 9 When Gesippus found out that his brideto-be was the beloved of his friend Titus, he offered to give her to him. At a later time, Titus offered to serve a sentence of death pronounced upon Gesippus. 10 While Damon and Pythias were visiting Syracuse, Damon was arrested and condemned to death by the tyrant Dionysius. Pythias offered himself as a hostage while Damon went home to settle his affairs; when Damon returned, he and Pythias each demanded to be the one executed. Dionysius was so impressed with their friendship that he pardoned Damon.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Four

All these and all that ever had bene tyde, In bands of friendship there did live for ever, Whose lives although decay’d, yet loves decayed never. 28

“Which when as I, that never tasted blis, Nor happie howre, beheld with gazefull eye, I thought there was none other heaven then this; And gan their endlesse happinesse envye, That being free from feare and gealosye, Might frankely there their loves desire possesse; Whilest I through paines and perlous jeopardie, Was forst to seeke my lifes deare patronesse: Much dearer1 be the things, which come through hard distresse.

29

“Yet all those sights, and all that else I saw, Might not my steps withhold, but that forthright2 Unto that purposd place I did me draw, Where as my love was lodged day and night: The temple of great Venus, that is hight The Queene of beautie, and of love the mother, There worshipped of every living wight; Whose goodly workmanship farre past all other That ever were on earth, all were they set together.

30

“Not that same famous Temple of Diane,3 Whose hight all Ephesus did oversee, And which all Asia sought with vowes prophane, One of the worlds seven wonders sayd to bee, Might match with this by many a degree: Nor that, which that wise King of Jurie4 framed, With endlesse cost, to be th’Almighties see;5 Nor all that else through all the world is named To all the heathen Gods, might like to this be clamed.

1

dearer: more valuable; more valued. forthright: directly. 3 Temple of Diane: the widely famed Temple of Artemis, or Diana, built in Ephesus (in what is now Turkey) in the sixth century BC and rebuilt in 356 BC after it burned. 2

4 Jurie: Jewry, i.e., King Solomon; see 1 Kings 6–7 for the building of the Temple of Jerusalem. 5 see: seat; dwelling (as a particular city or jurisdiction is said to be a bishop’s see).

Canto Ten

31

“I much admyring that so goodly frame, Unto the porch approcht, which open stood; But therein sate an amiable Dame, That seem’d to be of very sober mood, And in her semblant shewed great womanhood: Strange was her tyre; for on her head a crowne She wore much like unto a Danisk1 hood, Poudred2 with pearle and stone, and all her gowne Enwoven was with gold, that raught full low a downe.

32

“On either side of her, two young men stood, Both strongly arm’d, as fearing one another; Yet were they brethren both of halfe the blood, Begotten by two fathers of one mother, Though of contrarie natures each to other: The one of them hight Love, the other Hate, Hate was the elder, Love the younger brother; Yet was the younger stronger in his state Then th’elder, and him maystred still in all debate.

33

“Nathlesse that Dame so well them tempred both, That she them forced hand to joyne in hand, Albe that Hatred was thereto full loth, And turn’d his face away, as he did stand, Unwilling to behold that lovely band.3 Yet she was of such grace and vertuous might, That her commaundment he could not withstand, But bit his lip for felonous4 despight, And gnasht his yron tuskes at that displeasing sight.5

34

“Concord she cleeped was in common reed, Mother of blessed Peace, and Friendship trew; They both her twins, both borne of heavenly seed, And she her selfe likewise divinely grew; The which right well her workes divine did shew:

1

Danisk: Danish. Poudred: powdered. 3 lovely band: loving bond. 4 felonous: fierce. 2

411

5 Lotspeich writes, “Lady Concord is a mythical expression of the Neo-Platonic doctrine of the cosmic love which holds in harmony the four elements and all the conflicting forces of the world” (Greenlaw, Variorum, 226).

412

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

For strength, and wealth,1 and happinesse she lends, And strife, and warre, and anger does subdew: Of litle much, of foes she maketh frends, And to afflicted minds sweet rest and quiet sends. 35

“By her the heaven is in his course contained, And all the world in state unmoved stands, As their Almightie maker first ordained, And bound them with inviolable bands;2 Else would the waters overflow the lands, And fire devoure the ayre, and hell them quight,3 But that she holds them with her blessed hands. She is the nourse of pleasure and delight, And unto Venus grace the gate doth open right.4

36

“By her I entring halfe dismayed was, But she in gentle wise me entertayned,5 And twixt her selfe and Love did let me pas; But Hatred would my entrance have restrayned, And with his club me threatned to have brayned, Had not the Ladie with her powrefull speach Him from his wicked will uneath refrayned; And th’other eke his malice did empeach,6 Till I was throughly past the perill of his reach.

37

“Into the inmost Temple thus I came, Which fuming all with frankensence7 I found, And odours rising from the altars flame. Upon an hundred marble pillors round The roofe up high was reared from the ground, All deckt with crownes, and chaynes, and girlands gay, And thousand pretious gifts worth many a pound, The which sad lovers for their vowes did pay;8 And all the ground was strow’d with flowres, as fresh as May.

1

wealth: well-being. Cf. V.Pr., where the narrator laments the degeneration of the world and the changing of the planets’ courses. 3 quight: requite; completely. 4 I.e., and helps us gain access to love (which is the happiness offered by Venus). 2

5

entertayned: received. empeach: hinder. 7 frankensence: an aromatic tree gum burned as incense. 8 I.e., which they brought to the temple for offerings; sad: unhappy; serious (about their love). 6

Canto Ten

413

38

“An hundred Altars round about were set, All flaming with their sacrifices fire, That with the steme thereof the Temple swet,1 Which rould in clouds to heaven did aspire, And in them bore true lovers vowes entire: And eke an hundred brasen caudrons bright, To bath in joy and amorous desire, Every of which was to a damzell hight;2 For all the Priests were damzels, in soft linnen dight.

39

“Right in the midst the Goddesse selfe did stand Upon an altar of some costly masse, Whose substance was uneath to understand: For neither pretious stone, nor durefull3 brasse, Nor shining gold, nor mouldring4 clay it was; But much more rare and pretious to esteeme,5 Pure in aspect, and like to christall glasse, Yet glasse was not, if one did rightly deeme, But being faire and brickle,6 likest glasse did seeme.

40

“But it7 in shape and beautie did excell All other Idoles, which the heathen adore, Farre passing that, which by surpassing skill Phidias did make in Paphos8 Isle of yore, With which that wretched Greeke, that life forlore Did fall in love: yet this much fairer shined, But covered with a slender9 veile afore; And both her feete and legs together twyned Were with a snake, whose head and tail were fast combyned.

1

7

2

8

steme: steam; swet: sweated. hight: designated. 3 durefull: enduring. 4 mouldring: decaying; crumbling. 5 to esteeme: to be valued. 6 brickle: brittle. Berger points out the instability of the altar, despite its mass: “The ‘masse’ which really stands under the idol . . . is the oceanic world of cosmic violence and fecundity presented in the next canto as the setting for the Marriage of Rivers” (Berger, 199).

it: the statue of Venus. As Hillard argues in the Variorum, Spenser may be confusing Phidias of Paphos with Praxiteles of Cnidus, about whom Pliny writes that he was the first sculptor to make a statue of Venus without drapery. Upon seeing the statue, supposedly a young man fell in love with it (Variorum, 231; Pliny, Natural History, 36.5.21). 9 slender: thin; long and narrow.

414

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

41

“The cause why she was covered with a vele, Was hard to know, for that her Priests the same From peoples knowledge labour’d to concele. But sooth it was not sure1 for womanish shame, Nor any blemish, which the worke mote blame;2 But for, they say, she hath both kinds3 in one, Both male and female, both under one name: She syre and mother is her selfe alone, Begets and eke conceives, ne needeth other none.

42

“And all about her necke and shoulders flew A flocke of litle loves, and sports, and joyes,4 With nimble wings of gold and purple hew; Whose shapes seem’d not like to terrestriall boyes, But like to Angels playing heavenly toyes;5 The whilest their eldest brother was away, Cupid their eldest brother; he enjoyes The wide kingdome of love with Lordly sway, And to his law compels all creatures to obay.

43

“And all about her altar scattered lay Great sorts of lovers piteously complayning,6 Some of their losse, some of their loves delay, Some of their pride, some paragons disdayning,7 Some fearing fraud, some fraudulently fayning, As every one had cause of good or ill. Amongst the rest some one through loves constrayning, Tormented sore, could not containe it still, But thus brake forth, that all the temple it did fill.

44

“‘Great Venus, Queene of beautie and of grace,8 The joy of Gods and men, that under skie Doest fayrest shine, and most adorne thy place,

1

not sure: surely not. I.e., which might lessen the perfection of the statue. 3 kinds: sexes. 4 loves, and sports, and joyes: putti, winged babies embodying amorous enjoyments. As Berger notes, the love in this canto does not include the presence of human babies (Berger, 199). 2

5

toyes: frivolous games or tunes. sorts: groups; complayning: uttering Petrarchan plaints about the woes of being in love. 7 I.e., some complained about their disdainful beloveds. 8 Stanzas 44 through 47 are elegantly translated from Lucretius’ invocation to Venus at the beginning of De Rerum Natura (Greenlaw, Variorum, 234). 6

Canto Ten

415

That with thy smyling looke doest pacifie The raging seas, and makst the stormes to flie; Thee goddesse, thee the winds, the clouds doe feare, And when thou spredst thy mantle1 forth on hie, The waters play and pleasant lands appeare, And heavens laugh, and all the world shews joyous cheare. 45

“‘Then doth the dædale2 earth throw forth to thee Out of her fruitfull lap aboundant flowres, And then all living wights, soone as they see The spring breake forth out of his lusty bowres, They all doe learne to play the Paramours; First doe the merry birds, thy prety pages Privily pricked3 with thy lustfull powres, Chirpe loud to thee out of their leavy4 cages, And thee their mother call to coole their kindly rages.5

46

“‘Then doe the salvage beasts begin to play Their pleasant friskes,6 and loath their wonted food; The Lyons rore, the Tygres loudly bray, The raging Buls rebellow through the wood, And breaking forth, dare tempt7 the deepest flood, To come where thou doest draw them with desire: So all things else,8 that nourish vitall blood, Soone as with fury thou doest them inspire, In generation9 seeke to quench their inward fire.

47

“‘So all the world by thee at first was made, And dayly yet thou doest the same repayre: Ne ought on earth that merry is and glad, Ne ought on earth that lovely is and fayre, But thou the same for pleasure didst prepayre.10 Thou art the root of all that joyous is,

1

7

2

8

mantle: cloak. dædale: consummately artistic; skillfully inventive; variously adorned. 3 pricked: spurred. 4 leavy: leafy. 5 rages: vehement urges or passions. 6 friskes: frisking, games.

tempt: risk. all things else: all other things.

9

generation: propagation. Berger comments that these lovers “isolate love as a game from love as a function, love as a state of mind and a way of life from love as a natural process” (198).

10

416

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

Great God of men and women, queene of th’ayre, Mother of laughter, and welspring of blisse, O graunt that of my love at last I may not misse.’ 48

“So did he say: but I with murmure1 soft, That none might heare the sorrow of my hart, Yet inly groning deepe and sighing oft, Besought her to graunt ease unto my smart, And to my wound her gratious help impart. Whilest thus I spake, behold with happy eye I spyde, where at the Idoles feet apart2 A bevie of fayre damzels close3 did lye, Wayting when as the Antheme should be sung on hye.

49

“The first of them did seeme of ryper yeares, And graver countenance then all the rest; Yet all the rest were eke her equall peares, Yet unto her obayed all the best. Her name was Womanhood, that she exprest By her sad semblant and demeanure wyse: For stedfast still her eyes did fixed rest, Ne rov’d at randon after gazers guyse, Whose luring baytes oftimes doe heedlesse harts entyse.4

50

“And next to her sate goodly Shamefastnesse, Ne ever durst her eyes from ground upreare, Ne ever once did looke up from her desse,5 As if some blame of evill she did feare, That in her cheekes made roses oft appeare: And her against6 sweet Cherefulnesse was placed, Whose eyes like twinkling stars in evening cleare, Were deckt with smyles, that all sad humors chaced, And darted forth delights, the which her goodly graced.

1

murmure: complaint. apart: separated from the rest of the room (perhaps by being hidden by the idol’s skirts); near but slightly separated from the idol. 3 close: covered; together. 2

4 For women’s wandering eyes, see III.i.41.8.n. 5 desse: dais. 6 against: facing; on the opposite side. Despite the term “a round” in 52.1, it is not clear whether the women are in a circle, a line, or some other formation.

Canto Ten

51

“And next to her sate sober Modestie, Holding her hand upon her gentle hart; And her against sate comely Curtesie, That unto every person knew her part;1 And her before was seated overthwart2 Soft Silence, and submisse Obedience, Both linckt together never to dispart,3 Both gifts of God not gotten but from thence, Both girlonds of his Saints against their foes offence.4

52

“Thus sate they all a round5 in seemely rate: And in the midst of them a goodly mayd, Even in the lap of Womanhood there sate, The which was all in lilly white arayd, With silver streames6 amongst the linnen stray’d; Like to the Morne, when first her shyning face Hath to the gloomy world it selfe bewray’d, That same was fayrest Amoret in place, Shyning with beauties light, and heavenly vertues grace.

53

“Whom soone as I beheld, my hart gan throb, And wade in doubt, what best were to be donne: For sacrilege me seem’d the Church to rob,7 And folly seem’d to leave the thing undonne, Which with so strong attempt I had begonne. Tho shaking off all doubt and shamefast feare, Which Ladies love I heard had never wonne Mongst men of worth, I to her stepped neare, And by the lilly hand her labour’d up to reare.

54

“Thereat that formost matrone me did blame, And sharpe rebuke, for being over bold; Saying it was to Knight unseemely shame,

1 I.e., knew how to behave appropriately toward every person. 2 overthwart: obliquely; opposite. 3 dispart: part, separate. 4 The reader must decide whether all of these characteristics of womanhood are idealized only by Scudamour or also by the poem. Cf. the characteristics of ideal wom-

417

anhood mentioned in Spenser’s marriage poem Epithalamion––especially in stanzas 9, 11, and 13. 5 a round: in a circle; around about. 6 silver streames: i.e., silvery threads. 7 He would be robbing the temple of one of its vestal virgins.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Four

Upon a recluse Virgin to lay hold, That unto Venus services was sold.1 To whom I thus, ‘Nay but it fitteth best, For Cupids man with Venus mayd to hold, For ill your goddesse services are drest2 By virgins, and her sacrifices let to rest.’3 55

“With that my shield I forth to her did show, Which all that while I closely had conceld; On which when Cupid with his killing bow And cruell shafts emblazond she beheld, At sight thereof she was with terror queld, And said no more: but I which all that while The pledge of faith, her hand engaged held,4 Like warie Hynd within the weedie soyle,5 For no intreatie would forgoe so glorious spoyle.

56

“And evermore upon the Goddesse face Mine eye was fixt, for feare of her offence,6 Whom when I saw with amiable grace To laugh at me, and favour my pretence,7 I was emboldned with more confidence, And nought for nicenesse nor for envy sparing, In presence of them all forth led her thence, All looking on, and like astonisht staring, Yet to lay hand on her, not one of all them daring.

57

“She often prayd,8 and often me besought, Sometime with tender teares to let her goe, Sometime with witching9 smyles: but yet for nought, That ever she to me could say or doe,

1

sold: dedicated. drest: managed; ordered. 3 let to rest: allowed to cease. Scudamour argues that Venus’ temple should not be served by vestal virgins since virgins cannot perform the rites of love. 4 During an Anglican marriage, the groom took the bride by the right hand; see Spenser, Epithalamion, stanza 13. 2

5 Hynd: female deer; soyle: a stretch of water used as a refuge by hunted animals. 6 offence: being offended. 7 Either he imagines that the statue comes alive, or else it does so. 8 prayd: begged me; made prayers to the goddess. 9 witching: bewitching.

Canto Ten

419

Could she her wished freedome fro me wooe; But forth I led her through the Temple gate, By which I hardly1 past with much adoe: But that same Ladie which me friended late In entrance, did me also friend in my retrate. 58

1

“No lesse did Daunger threaten me with dread, When as he saw me, maugre all his powre, That glorious spoyle of beautie with me lead, Then Cerberus, when Orpheus did recoure His Leman from the Stygian Princes boure.2 But evermore my shield did me defend, Against the storme of every dreadfull stoure: Thus safely with my love I thence did wend.” So ended he his tale, where I this Canto end.

hardly: would hardly have. After his beloved wife, Eurydice, died, Orpheus journeyed into Hades to attempt to recover her and was threatened by Cerberus, the many-headed dog who was stationed at the mouth of Hades to keep dead souls from leaving and live persons from entering. Orpheus recovered Eurydice after pleasing Pluto with his music, so poets used 2

him as a type of the spectacularly gifted poet. Yet Pluto gave up Eurydice only on the condition that Orpheus would not look back at her as they left Hades. When Orpheus could not restrain himself and glanced back at her, she vanished and was lost to him forever. In other contexts, then, poets used Orpheus as an example of a man who tragically lacked erotic self-control.

Canto Eleven Marinells former wound is heald, he comes to Proteus hall, Where Thames doth the Medway wedd, and feasts the Sea-gods all.

1

But ah for pittie that I have thus long Left a fayre Ladie languishing in payne: Now well away,1 that I have doen such wrong, To let faire Florimell in bands remayne, In bands of love, and in sad thraldomes chayne; From which unlesse some heavenly powre her free By miracle, not yet appearing playne, She lenger yet is like captiv’d to bee: That even to thinke thereof, it inly pitties mee.2

2

Here neede you to remember, how erewhile Unlovely Proteus, missing3 to his mind That Virgins love to win by wit or wile, Her threw into a dongeon deepe and blind,4 And there in chaynes her cruelly did bind, In hope thereby her to his bent to draw: For when as neither gifts nor graces kind Her constant mind could move at all he saw, He thought her to compell by crueltie and awe.

3

Deepe in the bottome of an huge great rocke The dongeon was, in which her bound he left, That neither yron barres, nor brasen locke

1

well away: an exclamation of lament: “alas!” 2 With this stanza, the narrator picks up a thread he let drop fourteen cantos ago, when we last saw the true Florimell (III.viii.43). At that point, the narrator lamented the necessity of his leaving Florimell imprisoned in a cave hemmed in by the sea, in imminent danger of being

raped, but he promised to make her famous by way of compensation. Fourteen cantos later, he now shows signs of recalling that promise—though he considerately lets us know that only a miracle will prevent his writing a few other things first. 3 missing: failing. 4 blind: completely dark.

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421

Did neede to gard from force, or secret theft Of all her lovers, which would her have reft. For wall’d it was with waves, which rag’d and ror’d As they the cliffe in peeces would have cleft; Besides ten thousand monsters foule abhor’d Did waite about it, gaping griesly all begor’d.1 4

And in the midst thereof did horror dwell, And darkenesse dredd, that never viewed day, Like to the balefull house of lowest hell, In which old Styx2 her aged bones alway, Old Styx the Grandame of the Gods, doth lay. There did this lucklesse mayd seven months abide, Ne ever evening saw, ne mornings ray, Ne ever from the day the night descride, But thought it all one night, that did no houres divide.

5

And all this was for love of Marinell, Who her despysd (ah who would her despyse?) And wemens love did from his hart expell, And all those joyes that weake mankind entyse.3 Nathlesse his pride full dearely he did pryse; For of a womans hand it was ywroke,4 That of the wound he yet in languor lyes, Ne can be cured of that cruell stroke Which Britomart him gave, when he did her provoke.5

6

Yet farre and neare the Nymph his mother sought,6 And many salves did to his sore applie, And many herbes did use. But when as nought She saw could ease his rankling7 maladie,

1

begor’d: smeared with gore (from their previous victims). 2 Styx: a personification of the River Styx in Hades. 3 Marinell’s reasons for avoiding women are explained at III.iv.20–26; Florimell searches for him and hears a false report of his being slain at III.v.8–10. 4 ywroke: wreaked.

5

Britomart wounds Marinell at III.iv.12–18 (chronologically after his mother warns him against women, but narratively before we are given that information); his mother takes him to Liagore’s bower to be nursed at III.iv.29–44. 6 Mentally place commas around “his mother,” which is in apposition to “the Nymph”; she is not searching for some other nymph, but for cures. 7 rankling: festering.

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At last to Tryphon she for helpe did hie,1 (This Tryphon is the seagods surgeon2 hight) Whom she besought to find some remedie: And for his paines a whistle him behight3 That of a fishes shell was wrought with rare delight. 7

So well that Leach4 did hearke to her request, And did so well employ his carefull paine, That in short space his hurts he had redrest, And him restor’d to healthfull state againe: In which he long time after did remaine There with the Nymph his mother, like her thrall; Who sore against his will did him retaine, For feare of perill, which to him mote fall, Through his too ventrous prowesse proved over all.

8

It fortun’d then, a solemne feast was there To all the Sea-gods and their fruitfull seede, In honour of the spousalls, which then were Betwixt the Medway and the Thames agreed.5

1

As told at III.iv.43. surgeon: physician (whose practice is not confined to surgery in the modern sense). 3 behight: promised. 4 Leach: physician. 5 The remainder of the canto is devoted to the marriage ceremony of these two rivers, and especially to the cataloguing of other rivers who attend. The Thames (pronounced “Tims”) and the Medway issue into the North Sea right next to each other, mingling their waters. Approximately ten statute miles up the Medway lies the city of Rochester, where Spenser lived from 1579 to 1580 as secretary to the Bishop of Rochester; and Spenser would also have associated the Medway with the Sidney family’s estate of Penshurst, which lies further up the Medway. In writing this canto about a marriage of rivers, Spenser was following the example of several other poets, including Leland (Cygnea Cantio) and Camden (De Connubio Tamae et Isis, now surviving 2

only in fragments). Indeed, Spenser himself had earlier written Epithalamion Thamesis, a poem about the marriage of the Thames. Although that poem was not published and does not survive, Spenser describes it in a letter to Gabriel Harvey in 1580 as “setting forth the marriage of the Thames : I shewe his first beginning, and offspring, and all the Countrey, that he passeth thorough, and also describe all the Rivers throughout Englande, whyche came to this Wedding, and their righte names, and right passage, &c. A worke beleeve me, of much labour . . .” (Smith, 612). As Osgood points out in the Variorum, however, Spenser cannot simply have transferred that earlier poem to this canto, given that this canto draws heavily from Camden’s Britannia, which was not published until 1596; and given that the canto also draws heavily from knowledge Spenser gained of the Irish rivers during his years living there, which began in 1580 (Greenlaw, 241). The structure of the canto is intricate, with careful groupings of sea

Canto Eleven

423

Long had the Thames (as we in records reed) Before that day her wooed to his bed;1 But the proud Nymph would for no worldly meed, Nor no entreatie to his love be led; Till now at last relenting, she to him was wed. 9

So both agreed, that this their bridale feast Should for the Gods in Proteus house be made; To which they all repayr’d, both most and least,2 Aswell which in the mightie Ocean trade,3 As that in rivers swim, or brookes doe wade. All which not if an hundred tongues to tell, And hundred mouthes, and voice of brasse I had, And endlesse memorie, that mote excell, In order as they came, could I recount them well.

10

Helpe therefore, O thou sacred imp of Jove, The noursling of Dame Memorie his deare,4 To whom those rolles, layd up in heaven above, And records of antiquitie appeare, To which no wit of man may comen neare; Helpe me to tell the names of all those floods,5

gods, river gods, and rivers according to geography, genealogy, and etymology; yet the canto cannot be explained by pattern alone. It is no accident that Spenser wrote this canto in a century when cartography and books of national history flourished, the same century in which John Stow made his name by describing the important buildings, works, and history of every ward in London (Stow, Survey, 1598). All of these works helped construct England as a nation. More ambiguously, Spenser did some of the same for Ireland, even though in 1596 he advocated using dire means to subdue the Irish who resisted English rule (Spenser, View, e.g., 99–101). Fowler comments, “The choice of the Thames emphasizes both the edge and the interior of the island, and thus England’s relation to other nations, as well as the arrangement of its internal regions. . . . In Spenser’s time, English mili-

tary power was overwhelmingly waterbased . . .” (Fowler, 2003, 196). 1 bed: note the pun. 2 repayr’d: went; most and least: highest and lowest in social status. Note that although the feast is held in Proteus’ house, he is absent, being otherwise occupied in his dungeon. Fowler comments that this canto is built on a “doubled architectural space (hall and cave) and [a] doubled ceremony (marriage and rape)” (Fowler, 2003, 193). 3 trade: go. 4 The narrator is asking for inspiration from either Clio, the muse of history, or Calliope, the muse of epic poetry; all of the nine muses were daughters of Jove and Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory. Cf. I.Pr.2 and I.xi.5. 5 floods: bodies of water.

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And all those Nymphes, which then assembled were To that great banquet of the watry Gods, And all their sundry kinds, and all their hid abodes. 11

First came great Neptune with his threeforkt mace, That rules the Seas, and makes them rise or fall; His dewy lockes did drop with brine apace, Under his Diademe imperiall: And by his side his Queene with coronall,1 Faire Amphitrite,2 most divinely faire, Whose yvorie shoulders weren covered all, As with a robe, with her owne silver haire, And deckt with pearles, which th’Indian seas for her prepaire.

12

These marched farre afore the other crew; And all the way before them as they went, Triton3 his trompet shrill before them blew, For goodly triumph4 and great jollyment, That made the rockes to roare, as5 they were rent. And after them the royall issue came,6 Which of them sprung by lineall descent: First the Sea-gods, which to themselves doe clame The powre to rule the billowes, and the waves to tame.

13

Phorcys, the father of that fatall brood, By whom those old Heroes wonne such fame;7 And Glaucus,8 that wise southsayes understood; And tragicke Inoes sonne,9 the which became

1

coronall: crown or coronet. Amphitrite: Neptune’s wife, the daughter of Nereus. 3 Triton: half man, half fish. As Neptune’s son, he has the responsibility of blowing a trumpet to command the movement of the waves, as a herald would blow a trumpet to command a crowd to part for an important procession or to fall silent for an announcement. 4 triumph: Goldberg comments that this word designates the specific form of this entertainment: a “triumph” celebrated conquest and possession, whether of a territory, a country, or a bride (Goldberg, 140). 2

5

as: as if. I.e., Neptune and Amphitrite’s offspring. 7 Phorcys was the father of many monsters, including the Graeae (old women from the moment of birth), the Gorgons (including Medusa), the Chimaera (who breathed fire), and the dragon that guarded the Garden of the Hesperides. Heroes such as Perseus and Hercules acquired fame by vanquishing these monsters. 8 Glaucus: a prophet. 9 Inoes sonne: maddened by grief at seeing her husband kill her other son, Ino picked up her son Melicerta and jumped off a cliff 6

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425

A God of seas through his mad mothers blame, Now hight Palemon, and is saylers frend; Great Brontes, and Astræus, that did shame Himselfe with incest of his kin unkend;1 And huge Orion, that doth tempests still portend.2 14

The rich Cteatus, and Eurytus long;3 Neleus and Pelias lovely brethren both; Mightie Chrysaor, and Caïcus strong; Eurypulus, that calmes the waters wroth; And faire Euphœmus, that upon them goth As on the ground, without dismay or dread: Fierce Eryx, and Alebius that know’th The waters depth, and doth their bottome tread; And sad Asopus, comely with his hoarie head.

15

There also some most famous founders were Of puissant Nations, which the world possest;4 Yet sonnes of Neptune, now assembled here: Ancient Ogyges, even th’auncientest, And Inachus renowmd above the rest; Phœnix, and Aon, and Pelasgus old, Great Belus, Phœax, and Agenor best; And mightie Albion, father of the bold And warlike people, which the Britaine Islands hold.5

16

For Albion the sonne of Neptune was, Who for the proofe of his great puissance, Out of his Albion did on dry-foot pas Into old Gall, that now is cleeped France,6

into the sea. Taking pity on the two of them, the gods changed them into immortals and gave them new names. 1 Brontes was one of the Cyclops; Astræus committed incest with his sister. 2 The rising of the constellation Orion was said to bring rain. 3 Most of the adjectives given to the gods in this stanza play on the etymology of their names. 4 Spenser depends chiefly on Natalis Comes

for his information about the founders of nations (Mythologiae, 2.8). 5 Stanza 15 names the founders of Thebes, Argos, Phoenicia, Aonia, the Pelasgian inhabitants of early Greece, Babylon, Phaeacia, Carthage, and Britain, in that order. This and the geographical notes to the rest of this canto are greatly indebted to the researches of Osgood, Roche, and Hamilton. 6 The British Isles were thought to have been connected to the Continent at that time.

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To fight with Hercules, that did advance To vanquish all the world with matchlesse might, And there his mortall part by great mischance Was slaine: but that which is th’immortall spright Lives still: and to this feast with Neptunes seed was dight. 17

But what doe I their names seeke to reherse,1 Which all the world have with their issue2 fild? How can they all in this so narrow verse Contayned be, and in small compasse hild? Let them record them, that are better skild, And know the moniments of passed times: Onely what needeth, shall be here fulfild, T’expresse some part of that great equipage,3 Which from great Neptune do derive their parentage.

18

Next came the aged Ocean, and his Dame, Old Tethys, th’oldest two of all the rest, For all the rest of 4 those two parents came, Which afterward both sea and land possest: Of all which Nereus th’eldest, and the best, Did first proceed, then which none more upright, Ne more sincere in word and deed profest; Most voide of guile, most free from fowle despight, Doing him selfe, and teaching others to doe right.

19

Thereto he was expert in prophecies, And could the ledden5 of the Gods unfold, Through which, when Paris brought his famous prise The faire Tindarid lasse,6 he him fortold, That her all Greece with many a champion bold Should fetch againe, and finally destroy Proud Priams towne.7 So wise is Nereus old, And so well skild; nathlesse he takes great joy Oft-times amongst the wanton Nymphs to sport and toy.8

1

reherse: recount. issue: offspring. 3 equipage: retinue, following. 4 of: from. 5 ledden: language; speech. 2

6

Tindarid lasse: Helen, daughter of Tyndareus (see III.ix.34.9.n.). 7 Priams towne: Troy, the town of King Priam. 8 toy: play.

Canto Eleven

427

20

And after him the famous rivers came, Which doe the earth enrich and beautifie: The fertile Nile, which creatures new doth frame;1 Long Rhodanus,2 whose sourse springs from the skie; Faire Ister, flowing from the mountaines hie; Divine Scamander,3 purpled yet with blood Of Greekes and Trojans, which therein did die; Pactolus4 glistring with his golden flood, And Tygris5 fierce, whose streames of none may be withstood.

21

Great Ganges, and immortall Euphrates,6 Deepe Indus, and Mæander intricate,7 Slow Peneus, and tempestuous Phasides,8 Swift Rhene, and Alpheus still immaculate:9 Ooraxes, feared for great Cyrus fate;10 Tybris,11 renowmed for the Romaines fame, Rich Oranochy,12 though but knowen late; And that huge River, which doth beare his name Of warlike Amazons, which doe possesse the same.

22

Joy on those warlike women, which so long Can from all men so rich a kingdome hold; And shame on you, ô men, which boast your strong And valiant hearts, in thoughts lesse hard and bold,

1 For the Nile’s ability to cause spontaneous generation, see III.vi.8.5.n. 2 Rhodanus: the Rhone, which, like the Ister, flows from high in the Alps. 3 Scamander: a river that flowed through ancient Troy. 4 Pactolus: a Lydian river with a bed of golden sand. 5 Tygris: a river in Mesopotamia, named “tiger” for its fierce current. 6 Ganges . . . Euphrates: rivers in India and Syria. 7 Indus: a river on what was then the west border of India; Mæander: a winding river in Ionia. 8 Peneus: a Greek river; Phasides: the Phasis, a river in Colchis, on the Black Sea.

9 Rhene: the Rhine, in Germany; Alpheus: said to flow from the Peloponnesus through the sea to Sicily, magically keeping its own waters separated from the ocean. 10 Ooraxes: the River Araxes, between the Caspian and Black Seas; Cyrus: founder of Persia, who died in battle after crossing the Araxes. 11 Tybris: the River Tiber, which runs past Rome. 12 Oranochy: the Orinoco, a river in Venezuela discovered (in European terms) by Raleigh and thought by him to be the route to El Dorado, a city of gold that turned out to be mythical.

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Yet quaile in conquest of that land of gold.1 But this to you, ô Britons, most pertaines, To whom the right hereof it selfe hath sold; The which for sparing litle cost or paines, Loose so immortall glory, and so endlesse gaines. 23

Then was there heard a most celestiall sound, Of dainty musicke, which did next ensew Before the spouse: that was Arion2 crownd; Who playing on his harpe, unto him drew The eares and hearts of all that goodly crew, That even yet the Dolphin, which him bore Through the Agæan3 seas from Pirates vew, Stood still by him astonisht at his lore, And all the raging seas for joy forgot to rore.

24

So went he playing on the watery plaine. Soone after whom the lovely Bridegroome came, The noble Thamis, with all his goodly traine, But him before there went, as best became, His auncient parents, namely th’auncient Thame.4 But much more aged was his wife then he, The Ouze, whom men doe Isis rightly name; Full weake and crooked creature seemed shee, And almost blind through eld, that scarce her way could see.

25

Therefore on either side she was sustained Of two smal grooms, which by their names were hight The Churne, and Charwell,5 two small streames, which pained Them selves her footing to direct aright,

1

that land of gold: Guiana, in northern South America, which Raleigh explored and which he believed to be just north of a realm of Amazons. In his Discovery of Guiana, Raleigh balanced, as Spenser does here, between praising Elizabeth for her ability to command great armies and urging her to use those armies to put the Amazons under the rightful rule of men by having them perform a figural rape upon the country (see Montrose, 78).

2 Arion: a poet and musician of

Lesbos who was thrown into the sea by pirates but saved from drowning by dolphins, whom he had enchanted with his music. 3 Agæan: Ægæan. 4 Holinshed notes that the Rivers Thame and Isis join to become the Thamesis or Thames (1.79). 5 Churne, and Charwell: tributaries to the Isis.

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Which fayled oft through faint and feeble plight: But Thame was stronger, and of better stay;1 Yet seem’d full aged by his outward sight, With head all hoary, and his beard all gray, Deawed with silver drops, that trickled downe alway. 26

And eke he somewhat seem’d to stoupe afore With bowed backe, by reason of the lode, And auncient heavy burden, which he bore Of that faire City,2 wherein make abode So many learned impes, that shoote abrode,3 And with their braunches spred all Britany,4 No lesse then do her elder sisters5 broode. Joy to you both, ye double noursery, Of Arts, but Oxford thine doth Thame most glorify.

27

But he their sonne6 full fresh and jolly was, All decked in a robe of watchet7 hew, On which the waves, glittering like Christall glas, So cunningly enwoven were, that few Could weenen, whether they were false or trew. And on his head like to a Coronet He wore, that seemed strange to common vew, In which were many towres and castels set, That it encompast round as with a golden fret.8

28

Like as the mother of the Gods, they say, In her great iron charet wonts to ride, When to Joves pallace she doth take her way;

1

The Isis was actually a more major river, but Spenser wishes to privilege London’s river, the Thames, which takes more of its name from the Thame than from the Isis (Greenlaw, 252). 2 that faire City: Oxford, which was actually on the Isis rather than on the Thame. 3 As an imped, or grafted, branch shoots out new twigs. 4 Britany: Britain (rather than Bretagne, in France). 5 Spenser’s contemporaries at Oxford and Cambridge argued heatedly about which

university was older; Spenser awards the prize to Cambridge, his alma mater. 6 their sonne: the Thames. 7 watchet: light blue. 8 fret: ornamental, interlaced work, such as a gold net worn over the hair and adorned with jewels. Another definition is recorded in the language only 30 years later than The Faerie Queene and therefore may already have been in use: an ornamental border of intersecting lines (OED sb1 3). Hamilton speculates that the image may refer to London’s streets that border the Thames.

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Old Cybele,1 arayd with pompous pride, Wearing a Diademe embattild wide With hundred turrets, like a Turribant.2 With such an one was Thamis beautifide; That was to weet the famous Troynovant,3 In which her kingdomes throne is chiefly resiant.4 29

And round about him5 many a pretty Page Attended duely, ready to obay; All little Rivers, which owe vassallage To him, as to their Lord, and tribute pay: The chaulky Kenet, and the Thetis gray, The morish6 Cole, and the soft sliding Breane, The wanton Lee, that oft doth loose his way, And the still Darent, in whose waters cleane Ten thousand fishes play, and decke his pleasant streame.

30

Then came his neighbour flouds, which nigh him dwell, And water all the English soile throughout; They all on him this day attended well; And with meet service waited him about; Ne none disdained low to him to lout: No not the stately7 Severne grudg’d at all, Ne storming8 Humber, though he looked stout; But both him honor’d as their principall, And let their swelling waters low before him fall.

1 Cybele: a Phrygian goddess who became associated with the Greek Rhea; she was mother of the gods and the goddess of civilization. 2 Turribant: turban. 3 Troynovant: New Troy, a popular description of London. (For the connection between Troy and England, see III.iii.22.6.n., III.iii.26.2.n., and III.ix.34– 46). Fowler points out that the name also derives “from the British tribe ‘Trinobantes,’ who are found on many early maps to occupy the land north and west of the Thames estuary. In the annals of Tacitus

(14.29–38), their revolt for freedom from the Roman empire is described. Thus ‘Troynouant’ calls up both imperialist and anti-imperialist histories” (Fowler, 2003, 199). 4 her: Cybele’s; resiant: resident. 5 him: the Thames, to which the following six rivers are tributaries. 6 morish: marshy, swampy. 7 stately: because its name means “sovereign.” 8 storming: because its name derives from the Greek word for storm.

Canto Eleven

31

There was the speedy Tamar, which devides The Cornish and the Devonish confines;1 Through both whose borders swiftly downe it glides, And meeting Plim,2 to Plimmouth thence declines: And Dart, nigh chockt with sands of tinny mines. But Avon marched in more stately path, Proud of his Adamants,3 with which he shines And glisters wide, as als’ of wondrous Bath,4 And Bristow5 faire, which on his waves he builded hath.

32

And there came Stoure with terrible aspect, Bearing his sixe deformed heads on hye,6 That doth his course through Blandford plains direct, And washeth Winborne meades7 in season drye. Next him went Wylibourne8 with passage slye, That of his wylinesse his name doth take,9 And of him selfe doth name the shire thereby: And Mole, that like a nousling10 Mole doth make His way still under ground, till Thamis he overtake.

33

Then came the Rother, decked all with woods Like a wood God, and flowing fast to Rhy:11 And Sture, that parteth with his pleasant floods The Easterne Saxons from the Southerne ny,12 And Clare, and Harwitch13 both doth beautify:

1

Cornwall and Devon were shires in southwest England, though the Celtic inhabitants of Cornwall still did not think of themselves as English. 2 Actually, it doesn’t. 3 Adamants: not real diamonds in this case, but the so-called “Bristol diamonds,” of quartz. 4 Bath: a spa founded by the Roman occupiers of Britain. 5 Bristow: Bristol. 6 The Stoure has six sources. It is terrible because of its name: as one of Spenser’s favorite non-proper nouns, it means tumult, time of stress, or battle. 7 meades: meadows. 8 Wylibourne: the modern Wylye.

9

431

This etymology is Spenser’s invention. nousling: nuzzling, nosing. 11 Rhy: Rye, in Sussex. 12 The River Stour separates the county of Essex from that of Suffolk. The names’ etymological connections to the words “east” and “south” do not derive from the counties’ relationship to each other; indeed, Essex is south of Suffolk. Suffolk, or “South-Folk,” was so named because in the early Middle Ages it was in the southern portion of the Angle kingdom of East Anglia. Essex, whose name means “East Saxons,” was on the eastern part of a Saxon kingdom, much larger than the present county. 13 Clare, and Harwitch: towns beside the Stour. 10

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Him follow’d Yar,1 soft washing Norwitch wall, And with him brought a present joyfully Of his owne fish unto their festivall, Whose like none else could shew, the which they Ruffins2 call. 34

Next these the plenteous Ouse3 came far from land, By many a city, and by many a towne, And many rivers taking under hand Into his waters, as he passeth downe, The Cle, the Were, the Grant, the Sture, the Rowne.4 Thence doth by Huntingdon and Cambridge flit, My mother Cambridge, whom as with a Crowne He doth adorne, and is adorn’d of it With many a gentle Muse, and many a learned wit.

35

And after him the fatall Welland went, That if old sawes prove true (which God forbid) Shall drowne all Holland with his excrement, And shall see Stamford, though now homely hid, Then shine in learning, more then ever did Cambridge or Oxford, Englands goodly beames.5 And next to him the Nene6 downe softly slid; And bounteous Trent, that in him selfe enseames7 Both thirty sorts of fish, and thirty sundry streames.8

1

Yar: the River Yare, in Norfolk. A yare or yair is an enclosure extending into a river, for catching fish. 2 Ruffins: ruffs, prickly freshwater fish (Acerina cernua) of the perch family. 3 Next: next to; immediately after; Ouse: the Great Ouse, which flows from the East Midlands north into the Wash, an inlet of the North Sea. 4 The Grant is the Cam, which flows by Cambridge University and is a tributary to the Great Ouse. Huntingdon is not on the Cam, but on the Great Ouse, so line 6 must refer to the entire river system. 5 The Variorum and Roche mention various possible sources for this “old saw”—actually

two prophecies—that the River Welland would someday flood the part of Norfolk called Holland and that the University of Stamford would someday surpass Cambridge and Oxford. 6 Nene: another river that flows into the Wash. 7 enseames: brings together; introduces to each other. 8 Holinshed describes the Trent as teeming with salmon, sturgeon, and other fish, and he mentions its many tributarites (1.162), but Spenser gets the idea of thirty species and thirty tributaries from the river’s name, which means “thirty” in French.

Canto Eleven

36

Next these came Tyne, along whose stony bancke That Romaine Monarch built a brasen wall,1 Which mote the feebled Britons strongly flancke Against the Picts, that swarmed over all, Which yet thereof Gualsever they doe call: And Twede2 the limit betwixt Logris land And Albany: And Eden3 though but small, Yet often stainde with bloud of many a band Of Scots and English both, that tyned4 on his strand.

37

Then came those sixe sad brethren, like forlorne, That whilome were (as antique fathers tell) Sixe valiant Knights, of one faire Nymphe yborne, Which did in noble deedes of armes excell, And wonned there, where now Yorke people dwell; Still Ure, swift Werfe, and Oze the most of might,5 High Swale, unquiet Nide, and troublous Skell;6 All whom a Scythian king, that Humber hight, Slew cruelly, and in the river drowned quight.7

38

But past not long, ere Brutus8 warlicke sonne Locrinus them aveng’d, and the same date,9 Which the proud Humber unto them had donne,

1

Romaine Monarch: in CE 208, Emperor Lucius Septimius Severus directed the building of the Picts Wall (called “Gaul Sever” by the Romans) from coast to coast, approximately a hundred miles south of Hadrian’s wall, to keep out the Picts. In Book Two, however, Spenser credits this feat to Constantine II, who was emperor in the fourth century (II.x.62–63); brasen: in this context, the word simply means “firm and strong,” not actually made of brass. 2

Twede: a river that forms the border between England (Logris Land) and Scotland (Albany). 3 Eden: a river in Westmorland, alongside which the Scots and the English had fought. 4 tyned: perished; were defeated.

433

5

Still Ure, swift Werfe: tributaries to the Ouse in North Yorkshire (not to be confused with the Great Ouse discussed in 34.1.n.). 6 These three rivers are also tributaries to the Ouse; their epithets match the etymologies of their names. 7 The Ouse flows into the Humber, which empties into the sea. The story of the Scythian king is apparently Spenser’s invention, inspired by his interest in tracing both the English and the Irish back to the Scythian “barbarians” of northern Europe (as he mentions in View, 37–38; for a discussion of the Scythian connection, see Shuger, “Irishmen,” 495–501). 8

Brutus: legendary founder of the British race. 9 date: limit to the length of a life.

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By equall dome1 repayd on his owne pate: For in the selfe same river, where he late Had drenched them, he drowned him againe; And nam’d the river of his wretched fate; Whose bad condition yet it doth retaine, Oft tossed with his stormes, which therein still remaine. 39

These after, came the stony shallow Lone,2 That to old Loncaster his name doth lend; And following Dee, which Britons long ygone Did call divine, that doth by Chester tend;3 And Conway4 which out of his streame doth send Plenty of pearles to decke his dames withall, And Lindus5 that his pikes doth most commend, Of which the auncient Lincolne men doe call, All these together marched toward Proteus hall.

40

Ne thence the Irishe Rivers absent were, Sith no lesse famous then the rest they bee,6 And joyne in neighbourhood of kingdome nere, Why should they not likewise in love agree, And joy likewise this solemne day to see? They saw it all, and present were in place; Though I them all according their degree, Cannot recount, nor tell their hidden race, Nor read the salvage cuntreis,7 thorough which they pace.

41

There was the Liffy8 rolling downe the lea, The sandy Slane, the stony Aubrian,9 The spacious Shenan10 spreading like a sea,

1

dome: judgment. Lone: the River Lune, which empties into the Irish Sea at Lancaster, on the northwest coast of England. 3 divine: because “Dee” was supposed to have come from the Latin “diva,” the river was said to have the power of divination (predicting the future); tend: direct its course. 4 Conway: a river in North Wales. 5 Lindus: now known as the Witham; it flows through Lincoln and was said to have given that city its name. 2

6 To a primarily English readership, this would not have been a foregone conclusion. 7 cuntreis: countries, here meaning counties or regions of Ireland. 8 Liffy: a river that flows through the plains of Kildare. 9 Slane: a river whose bed is notably sandy for much of its length; it empties into the sea below Wexford; Aubrian: no one has identified this river, despite much speculation. 10 Shenan: the River Sionainn or Shannon, in Limerick, whose estuary is approximately fifty miles long.

Canto Eleven

435

The pleasant Boyne, the fishy fruitfull Ban,1 Swift Awniduff, which of the English man Is cal’de Blacke water, and the Liffar deep,2 Sad Trowis,3 that once his people overran, Strong Allo4 tombling from Slewlogher steep, And Mulla5 mine, whose waves I whilom taught to weep. 42

1

And there the three renowmed brethren6 were, Which that great Gyant Blomius begot,7 Of the faire Nimph Rheusa8 wandring there. One day, as she to shunne the season whot, Under Slewbloome in shady grove was got, This Gyant found her, and by force deflowr’d, Whereof conceiving, she in time forth brought These three faire sons, which being thence forth powrd In three great rivers ran, and many countreis scowrd.

Boyne: a river that flows from Kildare to Drogheda; it was noted for its passage through beautiful countryside; Ban: a river in Wexford. 2 Awniduff . . . Blacke water: Joyce explains that this is not Blackwater in Munster, near Spenser’s estate, but the northern Blackwater, which flows between Counties Armagh and Derry (Greenlaw, 266); Liffar: the River Foyle at Lifford in Donegal. McCabe discusses the extent to which English colonials rewrote Ireland’s history by reassigning place names: “The ‘Irish’ rivers can join in the celebrations only when they, like the people living along their banks, become ‘English’” (McCabe, 202). 3 Trowis: the Drowes, flowing from Lough Melvin into Donegal Bay. Joyce believes that Spenser thought the name came from the Irish truaghas, meaning “sadness” (Greenlaw, 268). 4 Allo: the Blackwater in Munster, near Spenser’s estate. 5 Mulla: the River Awbeg, which bordered Spenser’s estate on the west and south; it is a

tributary to the Munster Blackwater. For additional lines about the Mulla, see Spenser’s Colin Clouts Come Home Againe, lines 56 through 155. Spenser may have “taught” the Mulla “to weep” by constructing a small waterfall, but by the time he wrote Book Four, he had lived at Kilcolman long enough to associate the estate not only with beauty but also with sadness; his hopes for preferment at court in England had waned, and he did not believe that Elizabeth’s policies in Ireland would lead to the unification of Britain. (See, e.g., Hadfield 2004, 140–41; and Rambuss 2001, 30–32.) 6 three renowmed brethren: these three rivers, which Spenser’s contemporaries usually called the Three Sisters, are described in stanza 43. 7 Blomius: a personification of the Slieve Bloom Mountains. Spenser invented this story of the rivers’ origination in these mountains (and in the Devil’s Bit Mountains, which Spenser probably considered part of the same range). 8 Rheusa: meaning “to flow” (Greek).

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43

The first, the gentle Shure1 that making way By sweet Clonmell, adornes rich Waterford;2 The next, the stubborne Newre,3 whose waters gray By faire Kilkenny and Rosseponte boord,4 The third, the goodly Barow,5 which doth hoord Great heapes of Salmons in his deepe bosome: All which long sundred, doe at last accord To joyne in one, ere to the sea they come, So flowing all from one, all one at last become.

44

There also was the wide embayed Mayre,6 The pleasaunt Bandon7 crownd with many a wood, The spreading Lee,8 that like an Island fayre Encloseth Corke with his devided flood; And balefull Oure,9 late staind with English blood: With many more, whose names no tongue can tell. All which that day in order seemly good Did on the Thamis attend, and waited well To doe their duefull service, as to them befell.

45

Then came the Bride, the lovely Medua10 came, Clad in a vesture of unknowen geare,11 And uncouth fashion, yet her well became; That seem’d like silver, sprinckled here and theare With glittering spangs,12 that did like starres appeare,

1

Shure: the River Suir, flowing southward from Tipperary into Waterford. 2 Clonmell: this town is “sweet” because its name includes the Latin word for honey: mel; Waterford: a city on Waterford Harbor, where the Three Sisters empty into St. George’s Channel. 3 Newre: the River Nore, flowing southward through County Kilkenny. 4 Kilkenny and Rosseponte: towns, the latter now New Ross, in County Wexford; boord: border on. 5 Barow: the second longest river in Ireland, still noted for its salmon. It flows from Counties Laois and Kildare southward. 6 embayed: incorporating bays; Mayre: the River Kenmare in southwest County Kerry.

7

Bandon: flows eastward through County Cork, emptying into the Celtic Sea at Kinsale. 8 Lee: flows eastward through County Cork, dividing into many branches to encircle the smaller city of Cork in Spenser’s time before emptying into Cork Harbour. 9 Oure: Joyce identifies this as the River Avonberg in the County Wicklow. The Avonberg flows through a glen where the man whom Spenser served as secretary in Ireland, Lord Grey de Wilton, lost 800 men to an ambush by Irish rebels in 1580 (Greenlaw, 271). 10 Medua: the Medway. 11 geare: material. 12 spangs: spangles.

Canto Eleven

437

And wav’d upon, like water Chamelot,1 To hide the metall, which yet every where Bewrayd it selfe,2 to let men plainely wot, It was no mortall worke, that seem’d and yet was not. 46

Her goodly lockes adowne her backe did flow Unto her waste, with flowres bescattered, The which ambrosiall odours forth did throw To all about, and all her shoulders spred As a new spring; and likewise on her hed A Chapelet3 of sundry flowers she wore, From under which the deawy humour4 shed, Did tricle downe her haire, like to the hore5 Congealed litle drops, which doe the morne adore.

47

On her two pretty handmaides did attend, One cald the Theise, the other cald the Crane;6 Which on her waited, things amisse to mend, And both behind upheld her spredding traine; Under the which, her feet appeared plaine, Her silver feet, faire washt against this day: And her before there paced Pages twaine, Both clad in colours like, and like array, The Doune and eke the Frith, both which prepard her way.7

48

And after these the Sea Nymphs marched all, All goodly damzels, deckt with long greene haire, Whom of their sire Nereides 8 men call,

1 water Chamelot: watered camlet, an expensive fabric with a moiré weave, which tricks the eye into seeing wavy movement in the threads (originally made in the east of silk and camel hair, later of silk and wool or other materials). 2 The hiding and self-betrayal are not necessarily allegorically sinister. Aristocrats of the sixteenth century loved being fooled in clever ways during court entertainments, as for example by disguises; and in order to acquire the sprezzatura lauded by Castiglione, one built the self by concealing the self: a courtier pretended that a difficult skill acquired through hard practice had instead

come naturally and easily (Castiglione, Courtier, 45–9). 3 Chapelet: wreath for the head. 4 humour: moisture, in this case either dew or nectar from the flowers or river water from Medway herself. 5 hore: hoarfrost. 6 Theise . . . Crane: tributaries to the Medway. 7 Doune . . . Frith: it is unclear which streams Spenser means. 8 Nereides: Nereus and Doris’ fifty daughters, who are beneficent sea nymphs. Among them is Thetis, the mother of

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All which the Oceans daughter to him bare The gray eyde Doris: all which fifty are; All which she there on her attending had. Swift Proto, milde Eucrate, Thetis faire, Soft Spio, sweete Eudore, Sao sad, Light Doto, wanton Glauce, and Galene glad. 49

White hand Eunica, proud Dynamene, Joyous Thalia, goodly Amphitrite, Lovely Pasithee, kinde Eulimene, Light foote Cymothoe, and sweete Melite, Fairest Pherusa, Phao lilly white, Wondred1 Agave, Poris, and Nesæa, With Erato that doth in love delite, And Panopæ, and wise Protomedæa, And snowy neckd Doris, and milkewhite Galathæa.

50

Speedy Hippothoe, and chaste Actea, Large Lisianassa, and Pronæa sage, Euagore, and light Pontoporea, And she, that with her least word can asswage The surging seas, when they do sorest rage, Cymodoce, and stout Autonoe, And Neso, and Eione well in age, And seeming still to smile, Glauconome, And she that hight of many heastes2 Polynome.

51

Fresh Alimeda, deckt with girlond greene; Hyponeo, with salt bedewed wrests:3 Laomedia, like the christall sheene; Liagore, much praisd for wise behests; And Psamathe, for her brode snowy brests; Cymo, Eupompe, and Themiste just;

Achilles. Although Homer names fifty Nereids (Iliad, 18.39–49), Spenser’s list more closely matches the list in Hesiod (Theogony, 240–64). Spenser invents the names Phao and Poris (to replace Hesiod’s Protho and Cymatolege). Some of the Nereids’ epithets come from Homer and

Hesiod, whereas Spenser invented others; many of them are derived etymologically from the names. 1 Wondred: wonderful. 2 heastes: names. 3 wrests: wrists.

Canto Eleven

439

And she that vertue loves and vice detests Euarna, and Menippe true in trust, And Nemertea learned well to rule her lust. 52

All these the daughters of old Nereus were, Which have the sea in charge to them assinde, To rule his tides, and surges to uprere, To bring forth stormes, or fast them to upbinde, And sailers save from wreckes of wrathfull winde. And yet besides three thousand more there were Of th’Oceans seede, but Joves and Phœbus kinde; The which in floods and fountaines doe appere, And all mankinde do nourish with their waters clere.

53

The which, more eath it were for mortall wight, To tell1 the sands, or count the starres on hye, Or ought more hard, then thinke to reckon right. But well I wote, that these which I descry,2 Were present at this great solemnity: And there amongst the rest, the mother was Of luckelesse Marinell Cymodoce,3 Which, for my Muse her selfe now tyred has, Unto an other Canto I will overpas.

1 2

tell: count. descry: reveal; perceive.

3

Cymodoce: called Cymoent at III.iv.19.

Canto Twelve Marin for love of Florimell, In languor wastes his life: The Nymph his mother getteth her, And gives to him for wife.

1

O what an endlesse worke have I in hand, To count the seas abundant progeny, Whose fruitfull seede farre passeth those in land, And also those which wonne in th’azure sky? For much more eath1 to tell the starres on hy, Albe they endlesse seeme in estimation, Then to recount the Seas posterity: So fertile be the flouds in generation, So huge their numbers, and so numberlesse their nation.

2

Therefore the antique wisards2 well invented, That Venus of the fomy sea was bred;3 For that the seas by her are most augmented. Witnesse th’exceeding fry, which there are fed, And wondrous sholes, which may of none be red. Then blame me not, if I have err’d in count Of Gods, of Nymphs, of rivers yet unred: For though their numbers do much more surmount, Yet all those same were there, which erst I did recount.

3

All those were there, and many other more, Whose names and nations4 were too long to tell, That Proteus house they fild even to the dore;

1

eath: easy. antique wisards: sages of ancient times. 3 Hesiod writes that Kronos was the son of Gaea and Uranus (Earth and Heaven). Because Uranus loathed all of his children, Gaea urged them to take revenge on him, upon which advice Kronos took a scythe, cut off his father’s genitals, and threw them 2

into the sea. A white foam frothed around them, and from it the goddess Aphrodite (whom the Romans identified with Venus) stepped onto the island of Cytherea (Theogony, 130–201). 4 nations: classes, kinds, or races. (Spenser could also conceivably have been thinking of the fact that Irish clans were called nations.)

440

Canto Twelve

441

Yet were they all in order, as befell, According their degrees disposed well. Amongst the rest, was faire Cymodoce, The mother of unlucky Marinell, Who thither with her came, to learne and see The manner of the Gods when they at banquet be. 4

But for1 he was halfe mortall, being bred Of mortall sire, though of immortall wombe, He might not with immortall food be fed, Ne with th’eternall Gods to bancket2 come; But walkt abrode, and round about did rome, To view the building of that uncouth place, That seem’d unlike unto his earthly home: Where, as he to and fro by chaunce did trace, There unto him betid a disaventrous case.3

5

Under the hanging of an hideous clieffe, He heard the lamentable voice of one, That piteously complaind her carefull grieffe, Which never she before disclosd to none, But to her selfe her sorrow did bemone. So feelingly her case she did complaine, That ruth it moved in the rocky stone, And made it seeme to feele her grievous paine, And oft to grone with billowes beating from the maine.

6

“Though vaine I see my sorrowes to unfold, And count my cares, when none is nigh to heare, Yet hoping griefe may lessen being told,4 I will them tell though unto no man neare: For heaven that unto all lends equall eare, Is farre from hearing of my heavy plight;

1

for: because. bancket: banquet. 3 betid: betided, befell; disaventrous case: unlucky event, though Silberman observes that it could also mean “not accidental” in not being “adventurous” (OED 1; Silberman, 139). Alpers argues that 2

Marinell’s walking away from the marriage celebration enables the poem to demonstrate a “contrast between the enclosed world of the water deities and the fuller range of human experience” (122). 4 I.e., yet hoping that telling about the grief may lessen it.

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And lowest hell, to which I lie most neare, Cares not what evils hap to wretched wight; And greedy seas doe in the spoile of life delight. 7

“Yet loe the seas I see by often beating, Doe pearce the rockes, and hardest marble weares; But his hard rocky hart for no entreating Will yeeld, but when my piteous plaints he heares, Is hardned more with my aboundant teares. Yet though he never list to me relent, But let me waste in woe my wretched yeares, Yet will I never of my love repent, But joy that for his sake I suffer prisonment.

8

“And when my weary ghost with griefe outworne, By timely death shall winne her wished rest, Let then this plaint unto his eares be borne, That blame it is to him, that armes profest, To let her die, whom he might have redrest.” There did she pause, inforced to give place, Unto the passion, that her heart opprest, And after she had wept and wail’d a space, She gan afresh thus to renew her wretched case.

9

“Ye Gods of seas, if any Gods at all Have care of right, or ruth of wretches wrong, By one or other way me woefull thrall, Deliver hence out of this dungeon strong, In which I daily dying am too long. And if ye deeme me death for loving one, That loves not me, then doe it not prolong, But let me die and end my daies attone,1 And let him live unlov’d, or love him selfe alone.

10

“But if that life ye unto me decree, Then let mee live, as lovers ought to do, And of my lifes deare love beloved be: And if he shall through pride your doome2 undo,

1

attone: at once (rather than in this protracted manner).

2

doome: judgment.

Canto Twelve

443

Do you by duresse him compell thereto, And in this prison put him here with me: One prison fittest is to hold us two: So had I rather to be thrall, then free; Such thraldome or such freedome let it surely be. 11

“But ô vaine judgement, and conditions vaine, The which the prisoner points unto the free,1 The whiles I him condemne, and deeme his paine, He where he list goes loose,2 and laughes at me. So ever loose, so ever happy be. But where so loose or happy that thou art, Know Marinell that all this is for thee.” With that she wept and wail’d, as if her hart Would quite have burst through great abundance of her smart.

12

All which complaint when Marinell had heard, And understood the cause of all her care To come of him, for using3 her so hard, His stubborne heart, that never felt misfare Was toucht with soft remorse and pitty rare; That even for griefe of minde he oft did grone, And inly wish, that in his powre it weare Her to redresse: but since he meanes found none He could no more but her great misery bemone.

13

Thus whilst his stony heart with tender ruth Was toucht, and mighty courage mollifide,4 Dame Venus sonne that tameth stubborne youth With iron bit, and maketh him abide, Till like a victor on his backe he ride, Into his mouth his maystring5 bridle threw, That made him stoupe, till he did him bestride: Then gan he make him tread his steps anew, And learne to love, by learning lovers paines to rew.

1

I.e., it is useless for the prisoner to appoint judgment and conditions for the free person. 2 loose: free, unfettered—but also suggesting that he is too free in his laughter.

3

of: from; using: treating. mollifide: softened. 5 maystring: mastering. 4

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14

Now gan he in his grieved minde devise, How from that dungeon he might her enlarge; Some while he thought, by faire and humble wise To Proteus selfe to sue1 for her discharge: But then he fear’d his mothers former charge Gainst womens love, long given him in vaine. Then gan he thinke, perforce with sword and targe2 Her forth to fetch, and Proteus to constraine: But soone he gan such folly to forthinke againe.

15

Then did he cast to steale her thence away, And with him beare, where none of her might know. But all in vaine: for why3 he found no way To enter in, or issue forth below: For all about that rocke the sea did flow. And though unto his will she given were,4 Yet without ship or bote her thence to row, He wist not how her thence away to bere; And daunger well he wist long to continue there.

16

At last when as no meanes he could invent, Backe to him selfe, he gan returne the blame, That was the author of her punishment; And with vile curses, and reprochfull shame To damne him selfe by every evill name; And deeme unworthy or of love or life, That had despisde so chast and faire a dame, Which him had sought through trouble and long strife; Yet had refusde a God5 that her had sought to wife.

17

In this sad plight he walked here and there, And romed round about the rocke in vaine, As he had lost him selfe, he wist not where; Oft listening if he mote her heare againe; And still bemoning her unworthy6 paine. Like as an Hynde7 whose calfe is falne unwares

1

5

2

6

sue: ask. targe: lightweight shield. 3 for why: because. 4 I.e., even if she agreed to do what he asked.

a God: Proteus. unworthy: undeserved. 7 Hynde: female deer.

Canto Twelve

445

Into some pit, where she him heares complaine, An hundred times about the pit side fares, Right sorrowfully mourning her bereaved cares.1 18

And now by this the feast was throughly ended, And every one gan homeward to resort. Which seeing, Marinell was sore offended,2 That his departure thence should be so short,3 And leave his love in that sea-walled fort. Yet durst he not his mother disobay, But her attending in full seemly sort, Did march amongst the many all the way: And all the way did inly mourne, like one astray.

19

Being returned to his mothers bowre, In solitary silence far from wight, He gan record4 the lamentable stowre, In which his wretched love lay day and night, For his deare sake, that5 ill deserv’d that plight: The thought whereof empierst his hart so deepe, That of no worldly thing he tooke delight; Ne dayly food did take, ne nightly sleepe, But pyn’d, and mourn’d, and languisht, and alone did weepe.

20

That in short space his wonted chearefull hew Gan fade, and lively spirits deaded quight: His cheeke bones raw, and eie-pits hollow grew, And brawney armes had lost their knowen might, That nothing like himselfe he seem’d in sight. Ere long so weake of limbe, and sicke of 6 love He woxe, that lenger he note7 stand upright, But to his bed was brought, and layd above, Like ruefull ghost, unable once to stirre or move.

1

her bereaved cares: the loss of the fawn, which has been the focus of her cares. 2 offended: displeased. 3 short: happening shortly. 4 record: go over in his mind; meditate on.

5

that: who (referring to “his wretched love,” i.e., Florimell). 6 of: from, though with a play on “tired of love.” 7 note: could not.

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21

Which when his mother saw, she in her mind Was troubled sore, ne wist well what to weene, Ne could by search nor any meanes out find The secret cause and nature of his teene, Whereby she might apply some medicine; But weeping day and night, did him attend, And mourn’d to see her losse before her eyne, Which griev’d her more, that she it could not mend: To see an helpelesse evill,1 double griefe doth lend.

22

Nought could she read the roote of his disease, Ne weene what mister maladie it is, Whereby to seeke some meanes it to appease.2 Most did she thinke, but most she thought amis, That that same former fatall wound of his Whyleare by Tryphon was not throughly healed, But closely rankled under th’orifis:3 Least did she thinke, that which he most concealed, That love it was, which in his hart lay unrevealed.

23

Therefore to Tryphon she againe doth hast, And him doth chyde as false and fraudulent, That fayld the trust, which she in him had plast, To cure her sonne, as he his faith had lent: Who now was falne into new languishment Of his old hurt, which was not throughly cured. So backe he came unto her patient,4 Where searching every part, her well assured, That it was no old sore, which his new paine procured.

24

But that it was some other maladie, Or griefe unknowne, which he could not discerne: So left he her withouten remedie. Then gan her heart to faint, and quake, and earne,5 And inly troubled was, the truth to learne. Unto himselfe she came, and him besought,

1

helpelesse evill: a misfortune or trouble that cannot be alleviated. 2 appease: ameliorate. 3 th’orifis: i.e., the scar where the orifice of the wound had been.

4

I.e., to her patient (Marinell, who is under her care) or to her, patient (i.e., patiently). 5 earne: yearn.

Canto Twelve

447

Now with faire speches, now with threatnings sterne, If ought lay hidden in his grieved thought, It to reveale: who still her answered, there was nought. 25

Nathlesse she rested not so satisfide, But leaving watry gods, as booting nought,1 Unto the shinie heaven in haste she hide,2 And thence Apollo King of Leaches3 brought. Apollo came; who soone as he had sought Through his disease, did by and by out find, That he did languish of some inward thought, The which afflicted his engrieved mind; Which love he red to be, that leads each living kind.

26

Which when he had unto his mother told, She gan thereat to fret, and greatly grieve. And comming to her sonne, gan first to scold, And chyde at him, that made her misbelieve: But afterwards she gan him soft to shrieve,4 And wooe with faire intreatie, to disclose, Which of the Nymphes his heart so sore did mieve.5 For sure she weend it was some one of those, Which he had lately seene, that for his love he chose.

27

Now lesse she feared that same fatall read,6 That warned him of womens love beware: Which being ment of mortall creatures sead, For love of Nymphes she thought she need not care, But promist him, what ever wight she weare, That she her love, to him would shortly gaine: So he her told: but soone as she did heare That Florimell it was, which wrought his paine, She gan a fresh to chafe, and grieve in every vaine.

1

Her sudden dismissal of the efficacy of all “watry gods” makes complete sense psychologically but carries a certain amount of humor for the reader, who has just finished an entire canto devoted to the praises of watery gods. 2 hide: hied, hastened. 3 Leaches: physicians. Cf. vi.1.9 and note. 4 shrieve: question; ask him to confess.

5

mieve: move. read: prophecy (see III.iv.25–27). The prophecy told him to beware women, not to beware women’s love. Cymodoce still does not understand that Marinell has already suffered—and recovered from—the fulfillment of the prophecy, in being wounded by Britomart (III.iv.12–18). 6

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28

Yet since she saw the streight extremitie, In which his life unluckily was layd, It was no time to scan1 the prophecie, Whether old Proteus true or false had sayd, That his decay should happen by a mayd. It’s late in death of daunger to advize, Or love forbid him, that is life denayd: But rather gan in troubled mind devize, How she that Ladies libertie might enterprize.

29

To Proteus selfe to sew2 she thought it vaine, Who was the root and worker of her woe: Nor unto any meaner3 to complaine, But unto great king Neptune selfe did goe, And on her knee before him falling lowe, Made humble suit unto his Majestie, To graunt to her, her sonnes life, which his foe A cruell Tyrant had presumpteouslie By wicked doome condemn’d, a wretched death to die.

30

To whom God Neptune softly smyling, thus; “Daughter me seemes of double wrong ye plaine, Gainst one that hath both wronged you, and us:4 For death t’adward5 I ween’d did appertaine To none, but to the seas sole Soveraine. Read therefore who it is, which this hath wrought, And for what cause; the truth discover plaine. For never wight so evill did or thought, But would some rightfull cause pretend, though rightly nought.”

31

To whom she answerd, “Then it is by name Proteus, that hath ordayn’d my sonne to die; For that a waift,6 the which by fortune came Upon your seas, he claym’d as propertie: And yet nor his, nor his in equitie,

1

5

2

6

scan: estimate the correctness or value of. sew: apply; ask. 3 meaner: less powerful or important. 4 us: the royal pronoun, applying only to himself.

adward: award, sentence. waift: waif; legally, unclaimed property that should have reverted to the crown; something wafted over water.

Canto Twelve

449

But yours the waift by high prerogative. Therefore I humbly crave your Majestie, It to replevie, and my sonne reprive:1 So shall you by one gift save all us three alive.” 32

He graunted it: and streight his warrant made, Under the Sea-gods seale autenticall,2 Commaunding Proteus straight t’enlarge the mayd, Which wandring on his3 seas imperiall, He lately tooke, and sithence kept as thrall. Which she receiving with meete thankefulnesse, Departed straight to Proteus therewithall: Who reading it with inward loathfulnesse,4 Was grieved to restore the pledge, he did possesse.

33

Yet durst he not the warrant to withstand, But unto her delivered Florimell. Whom she receiving by the lilly hand, Admyr’d her beautie much, as she mote well: For she all living creatures did excell; And was right joyous, that she gotten had So faire a wife for her sonne Marinell. So home with her she streight the virgin lad, And shewed her to him, then being sore bestad.

34

Who soone as he beheld that angels face, Adorn’d with all divine perfection, His cheared heart eftsoones away gan chace Sad death, revived with her sweet inspection,5 And feeble spirit inly felt refection;6 As withered weed through cruell winters tine, That feeles the warmth of sunny beames reflection, Liftes up his head, that did before decline And gins to spread his leafe before the faire sunshine.7

1

replevie: repleve, to post bail for someone in prison or restore goods to a person on condition that he or she will undergo a trial to determine whether the goods may be permanently retained; reprive: reprieve; rescue from death (OED 4). 2 autenticall: legally authentic. 3 his: Neptune’s.

4

loathfulnesse: deep reluctance. her sweet inspection: her sweet regard of him; his sweet regard of her. 6 refection: refreshment. 7 The woman with the flower name has spent time in the sea, and now the man with the marine name is rejuvenated like a flower. 5

450 35

1

The Faerie Queene: Book Four

Right so himselfe did Marinell upreare, When he in place his dearest love did spy; And though his limbs could not his bodie beare, Ne former strength returne so suddenly, Yet chearefull signes he shewed outwardly. Ne lesse was she in secret hart affected, But that she masked it with modestie, For feare she should of lightnesse be detected:1 Which to another place I leave to be perfected.2

detected: accused. Alpers observes that although Book Four ends happily, its ending is about the incipient stages of Florimell and Marinell’s union, rather than about the completion of that 2

union (Alpers, 109). Although Book Four ends somewhat more abruptly than do the other books, none of the books concludes with a resolution. See Introduction, 5g, and see Goldberg, Endlesse Worke, passim.

THE LETTER TO RALEIGH A Letter of the Authors expounding his whole intention in the course of this worke: which for that it giueth great light to the Reader, for the better vnderstanding is hereunto annexed. To the Right noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh knight, Lo. Wardein of the Stanneryes, and her Maiesties liefetenaunt of the County of Cornewayll.1 Sir knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, and this booke of mine, which I have entituled the Faery Queene, being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good aswell for avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned.The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline:2 Which for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible3 and pleasing, being coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter, then for profite of the ensample: I chose the historye of king Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In which I have followed all the antique Poets historicall, first Homere, who in the Persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his Odysseis: then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person of Aeneas: after him Ariosto comprised them 1

Appended to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh,” also called “A Letter of the Authors,” has been read as a preface, detailing both the larger plot and the poetics underlying the poem. It was not included in the 1596 edi-

tion, and so only discusses the first three books directly. 2 discipline: learning, training, orderly conduct, the system by which a church exercises control over its members. 3 plausible: deserving applause, acceptable.

451

452

The Faerie Queene: Books Three and Four

both in his Orlando:1 and lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that part which they in Philosophy call Ethice, or vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo:The other named Politice in his Godfredo.2 By ensample of which excellente Poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised,3 the which is the purpose of these first twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encoraged, to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hee came to be king.4 To some I know this Methode will seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the use of these dayes seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon preferred before Plato, for that the one in the exquisite depth of his judgement, formed a Commune welth such as it should be, but the other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a government such as might best be: So much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by ensample, then by rule.5 So have I laboured to doe in the person of Arthure: whome I conceive after his long education by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery land. And yet in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady, this latter part in some places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phoebe and Cynthia being both names of Diana).6 So in the person of 1

Lodovico Ariosto, Italian author of Orlando Furioso (1532). 2 Torquato Tasso, Italian author of Rinaldo (1562) and Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), in which the hero Godfredo embodies public or political virtues. 3 Aristotle does not name twelve particular moral virtues in the Nicomachaean Ethics. There are, however, several Medieval and Renaissance commentaries on Aristotle from which twelve could be construed. 4 Spenser indicates that he planned twelve books for The Faerie Queene and would

willingly write twenty-four, the former matching Virgil, the latter Homer. 5 Spenser says that Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, celebrated for teaching by example, is commonly preferred to Plato’s Republic, which taught by precepts. 6 Belphoebe appears in Books Two, Three, and Four. Cynthia refers to Raleigh’s poem of that name, which also celebrated Elizabeth. Spenser suggests that Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, represents Elizabeth’s public role as monarch, while Belphoebe personifies her private, virginal life.

The Letter to Raleigh

453

Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particular, which vertue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue, which I write of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues, I make xii. other knights the patrones, for the more variety of the history: Of which these three bookes contayn three.The first of the knight of the Redcrosse, in whome I expresse Holynes:The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette forth Temperaunce: The third of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the Methode of a Poet historical is not such, as of an Historiographer. For an Historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a Poet thrusteth into the middest,1 even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a pleasing Analysis of all.The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an Historiographer should be the twelfth booke, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queene kept her Annuall feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, are in these xii books severally handled and discoursed.The first was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe a tall clownishe 2 younge man, who falling before the Queen of Faries desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen, that being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after entred a faire Ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a white Asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the Armes of a knight, and his speare in the dwarfes hand. Shee falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned that her father and mother an ancient King and Queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen3 Castle, who thence suffred them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wondering, and the Lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly importuned his desire. In the end the Lady told him that unlesse that armour which she brought, would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint Paul v. Ephes.4) that he could not succeed in that enterprise, which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furnitures5 thereunto, he seemed

1

4

2

5

See Horace, Ars Poetica, 146–52. clownishe: rustic. 3 brasen: strong like brass.

See Eph. 6.11–17. dewe furnitures: proper equipment.

454

The Faerie Queene: Books Three and Four

the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady. And eftesoones1 taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge Courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke, vz. A gentle knight was pricking on the playne. &c. The second day ther came in a Palmer bearing an Infant with bloody hands, whose Parents he complained to have bene slayn by an Enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him some knight, to performe that adventure, which being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same Palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole subject thereof.2 The third day there came in, a Groome who complained before the Faery Queene, that a vile Enchaunter called Busirane had in hand a most faire Lady called Amoretta, whom he kept in most grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her body.Whereupon Sir Scudamour the lover of that Lady presently tooke on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason of the hard Enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but rather as Accidents, then intendments.3 As the love of Britomart, the overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like.4 Thus much Sir, I have briefly overronne to direct your understanding to the welhead of the History, that from thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ye may as in a handfull gripe al the discourse, which otherwise may happily5 seeme tedious and confused. So humbly craving the continuaunce of your honorable favour towards me, and th’eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. 23. January. 1589.6

Yours most humbly affectionate. Ed. Spenser.

1

eftesoones: immediately. This description is at variance with the beginning of Book Two at several points— e.g., the Palmer is already with Guyon when they encounter the bloody baby in Canto One. 2

3

intendments: matters of central import. This description seems to make Scudamour the hero, rather than Britomart. 5 happily: by chance. 6 In the new calendar, 1590. 4

THE LIFE OF EDMUND SPENSER Spenser (c. 1552–1599) was from a merchant family, possibly involved in the cloth trade and probably living in London. Although he may have been related to the noble family of Spencers, Spenser was not a gentleman. He was fortunate to attend the Merchant Taylors’ School, an academy founded by the tailors’ guild, and was registered there as a “poor scholar.” The school, however, was excellent; in his eight years there, Spenser received a humanist education that was rich in classical scholarship and languages. In 1569 he entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Again he was a scholarship student, called a sizar, earning room and board by performing servants’ duties. In the same year that he arrived at Cambridge, Spenser was first published: several of his translations from Italian and French appeared in the Protestant miscellany A Theatre for Worldlings. Spenser completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1573, and then, in 1576, a Master of Arts (finishing 66th out of a class of 70). Spenser then began a career as secretary to high-ranking men, a position of some importance involving a broad array of duties that included much traveling and writing. Intermittent records show him serving as an emissary for the earl of Leicester, and in 1578 he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. In 1579 he married Maccabaeus Chylde; we know little about the couple’s family life other than the fact that they had two children. In 1580 he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, and traveled there with him. Spenser’s career as a secretary and subsequent work as a civil servant in Ireland no doubt took up much of his time. But he was simultaneously establishing a second career as a poet. Probably while working for Leicester, Spenser met Philip Sidney and entered into his sophisticated literary circle. In 1579 Spenser published The Shepheardes Calender, his innovative and enormously influential collection of pastorals. It revealed Spenser not only as one of England’s most skilled poets, but as a deeply interested and progressive Protestant thinker. He also cultivated his university friendship with the humanist scholar Gabriel Harvey, which in 1580 led to the publication of several of their letters. The Harvey letters mention several lost works, and suggest that by 1580 Spenser had begun working on The Faerie Queene. Meanwhile, in Ireland with Lord Grey, Spenser participated in the complicated and exceedingly violent project of English colonialism. Grey was sent to govern a country that was struggling broadly against English domination, and he adopted a strategy of overwhelming force, including the notorious slaughter of 600 military prisoners at Smerwick, and policies aimed at subduing the population through famine. To what 455

456

The Faerie Queene: Books Three and Four

extent Spenser participated in Grey’s governance, and to what extent he merely accompanied him and performed secretarial duties, is unclear. But it is clear that Spenser profited personally from empire building. Although Grey was recalled to England in 1582, Spenser made Ireland his permanent home, first in the New Abbey estate, and in 1589 in the three thousand acres of the Kilcolman estate. Throughout the 1580s, Spenser received a number of governmental appointments and established himself in Ireland as a well-off planter and gentleman. His complex relationship to Ireland is largely understood through A View of the Present State of Ireland, a prose dialogue that forthrightly defends Grey’s violent tactics and advocates deeply repressive measures against the Irish. It has called forth both defenses of the poet and declarations of his complicity in the outrages of colonialism. The subtleties of A View cast a similarly complicated light on The Faerie Queene, which was written in Ireland, and reflects its beautiful and pitifully war-torn landscape. In Ireland Spenser became friends with the explorer, author, and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh, who in 1589 traveled with him to England. Probably with the sponsorship of Raleigh, Spenser presented the first three books of The Faerie Queene to Elizabeth, who, by Spenser’s report, was well pleased. Spenser secured the printer William Ponsonby in London, and Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were published in 1590. The poem was a clear effort to win court favor, with a dedication to Elizabeth and as many as seventeen dedicatory sonnets to the major figures in court. As a reward, Spenser was granted a pension of £50 a year for life. Such a position in the patronage system of the day was not unusual, as poetry was commonly used as a means of preferment in court— for noblemen such as Sidney and Raleigh, it was one more personal accomplishment; for those like Spenser who were not noble, it was a way to win social and economic advantages. Spenser, however, maintained skepticism toward court life. In his pastoral “Colin Clouts Come Home Againe,” which tells of his and Raleigh’s journey to court, Colin declares that it is no sort of life, For shepheard fit to lead in that same place, Where each one seeks with malice and with strife, To thrust downe other into foule disgrace, Himselfe to raise. (688–92) Spenser returned to Ireland, where he lived, worked, and wrote throughout the 1590s. He published several important poems under the title of Complaints in 1591. In 1594 he married Elizabeth Boyle, resulting

The Life of Edmund Spenser

457

in at least one child, and in the following year he published Amoretti and Epithalamion, which celebrate their love and marriage. Throughout these years he continued work on The Faerie Queene, and in 1596 published the second edition. This extended the poem to six books; its final form was reached in the posthumous 1609 edition, with the inclusion of the fragment of a seventh book, The Mutabilitie Cantos. In 1596 he also published Fowre Hymnes and Prothalamion. Spenser may have traveled to London to oversee the second printing of The Faerie Queene. If so, he returned to an Ireland wracked by rebellion. In 1598 the Tyrone Rebellion reached Munster, and Spenser and his family fled Kilcolman just before the estate was sacked and burned. Spenser carried letters from the President of Munster to the Privy Council in England, describing the military crisis. On January 13, 1599, while still in England, Spenser died. His life ended under the shadow cast by the destruction of his home and the scattering of his interests in Ireland, which Ben Jonson described, possibly hyperbolically, as dying “for lack of bread.” Spenser’s hearse was reportedly attended by poets, who threw their verses and pens into his tomb as he was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

TEXTUAL NOTES The text of Book Three in this volume is based upon the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23081), though the University of Oregon graciously allowed the downloading of their Renascence Online text of the Grosart edition (based on the 1596 edition) as a point of departure. The text in this volume was edited from a reproduction of the original in the British Library by way of microfilm (UMI, Early English Books, 1475–1640) and Early English Books Online (eebo.chadwyck.com). It has been checked against the Faults Escaped printed at the end of the 1590 edition (F.E.) and against the 1596 edition (STC 23082) and the 1609 edition (STC 23083). The text of the 1596 ending to Book Three and the text of Book Four in this volume are based upon the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene (again with the assistance of Renascence Online). These were edited from a reproduction of the original in the Huntington Library by way of UMI microfilm and Early English Books Online. They have been checked against the 1609 edition. For both books, quotation marks have been added; i, j, u, v, the long s, and vv have been modernized; the erratically-used spaces before punctuation marks have been deleted; and abbreviations, ampersands, and diphthongs have been spelled out. Departures from the 1590 edition in Book Three or from the 1596 edition in Book Four have been made only with the aim of clarifying the text for modern readers. The table below lists substantive variants from each of the copy texts, variants of punctuation (except for inverted typefaces), significant variants of the spellings of proper nouns, and any other variants that might influence interpretation. In addition, the table lists instances in which this edition differs from the text edited by Hamilton, Yamashita, and Suzuki. For a complete list of all variants in these editions, see Hamilton. III.Pr. Praxiteles] 1596, 1609; Praxitcles 1590. III.i.Arg.3 Malecastaes] F.E.; Materastaes 1590, 1596, 1609. III.i.6.5 But] 1596, 1609; Rut 1590. III.i.7.6 thee] 1596, 1609; the 1590. III.i.12.9 ryde.] 1596, 1609; ryde, 1590. III.i.29.9 fight.] 1596, 1609; fight, 1590. III.i.30.6 mard] F.E.; shard 1590, 1596, 1609.

III.i.44.5 brethen] 1590; brethren P.V. in 1590. III.i.47.1 wight,] 1609; wight. 1590, 1596. III.i.49.8 deeds] 1590; deeds, P.V. in 1590. III.i.53.2 griefe,] 1596, 1609; griefe. 1590. III.i.60.8 wary] 1609; weary 1590, 1596. III.i.61.6 spake,] 1596, 1609; spake. 1590. III.i.67.9 went.] 1596, 1609; went 1590. III.ii.3.6 too] 1596, 1609; to 1590.

458

Textual Notes III.ii.6.8 thread;] 1596, 1609; thread, 1590. III.ii.8.5 I to prove,] 1596, 1609; to prove, I 1590, Hamilton. III.ii.30.5 dight] 1596, 1609; dight, 1590. III.ii.33.9 debarre;] 1609; debarre. 1590; debarre, 1596, Hamilton. III.ii.36.1 others] 1596, 1609; other 1590, Hamilton. III.ii.41.2 Nor] F.E.; Not 1590, 1596, 1609. III.ii.50.1 off] 1596, 1609; of 1590. III.ii.50.2 Them] F.E., 1596, 1609; Then 1590. III.iii.1.8 Dame,] 1596, 1609; Dame. 1590. III.iii.2.9 moniments.] 1596, 1609; moniments 1590. III.iii.39.9 guifts] 1596, 1609; guists 1590. III.iii.43.9 from off the earth] F.E.; from th’earth 1590, 1596, 1609. III.iii.50.9 Hee] F.E., 1609; Shee 1590, 1596. III.iii.53.3 teach] 1596, 1609; teach. 1590. III.iii.55.1 sway,] 1596, 1609; sway 1590. III.iii.60.9 fit.] 1609; fit 1590, 1596. III.iv.4.9 meed.] 1596, 1609; meed 1590. III.iv.5.8 she] 1596, 1609; he 1590. III.iv.6.9 to the] 1596, 1609; tot he 1590. III.iv.15.6 speare] 1609; speares 1590, 1596, Hamilton. III.iv.20.9 sonne.] 1596, 1609; sonne 1590. III.iv.27.6 fleshly] 1596, 1609; fleshy 1590. III.iv.28.1 this that] 1596, 1609; this thar 1590.

459

III.iv 30.4 gamesome] 1609; gameson 1590, 1596. III.iv.30.6 swownd] 1590; swowne 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.iv.41.7 there] 1609; their 1590, 1596. III.iv.48.1 off] 1596; of 1590, 1609. III.iv.53.4 dismayd;] 1596, 1609; dismayd, 1590. III.iv.60.4 bright,] 1609; bright? 1590, 1596. III.iv.60.9 rowme] 1596, 1609; ro wme 1590. III.v.6.9 where?] 1609; where. 1590, 1596. III.v.14.2 beast,] 1609; beast; 1590, 1596. III.v.16.9 despight.] 1596, 1609; despight 1590. III.v.17.3 wade] F.E., 1596, 1609; made 1590. III.v.19.5 no] 1596, 1609; now 1590. III.v.20.2 will;] 1596, 1609; will, 1590. III.v.21.9 bloud] 1596, 1609; flood 1590. III.v.30.7 better] 1596, 1609; bitter 1590. III.v.33.2 peeces] 1596, 1609; peeees 1590. III.v.40.4 loves sweet] 1596, 1609; sweet loves 1590, Hamilton. III.v.40.9 living] 1596, 1609; liking 1590. III.v.41.2 rest.] 1609; rest, 1590, 1596; rest; Hamilton. III.v.41.4 drest;] 1596, 1609; drest, 1590. III.v.46.5 restore:] 1590, 1596, 1609; restore? Smith, Hamilton. III.v.52.6 admyre:] 1609; admyre 1590, 1596.

460

Textual Notes

III.v.53.9 weare] 1596, 1609; were 1590. III.v.55.9 complement.] 1596, 1609; complement; 1590. III.vi.3.9 was] 1596, 1609; were 1590. III.vi.4.4 Belphœbe] 1609; Belphæbe 1590, 1596. III.vi.17.6 off] 1596, 1609; of 1590. III.vi.21.5 apayd,] 1590; apayd. 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.vi.26.4 fugitive.] 1590; fugitive, both farre and nere. 1596, 1609; Hamilton. III.vi.28.3 Phœbe] 1609; Phæbe 1590, 1596. III.vi.29.5 Gnidus] 1596, 1609; Gnidas 1590. III.vi.45.3 1/2 _____] 1590, 1596; And dearest love, 1609, Hamilton. (This line is not in 1590 or 1596.) III.vi.45.4 Narcisse] 1596, 1609; Marcisse 1590. III.vi.52.9 launched] 1596; launch 1590; launced 1609. III.vii.Arg.4 Gyaunts] 1596, 1609; Gynunt 1590. III.vii.1.8 she did] 1596, 1609; he did 1590. III.vii.1.9 escapt] 1596, 1609; eseapt 1590. III.vii.15.8 mind;] 1596, 1609; mind, 1590. III.vii.17.7 conquered] 1596, 1609; conpuered 1590. III.vii.23.4 he] 1596, 1609; she 1590. III.vii.36.3 beast,] 1596; beast. 1590; Beast 1609. III.vii.37.2 off] 1596, 1609; of 1590. III.vii 39.9 tare.] 1596, 1609; tare 1590. III.vii.42.6 hee] F.E., 1596, 1609; she 1590. (F.E. “500” refers to the wrong page.)

III.vii.42.6 stund] F.E., 1596, 1609; stuned 1590. (F.E. “500” refers to the wrong page.) III.vii.43.8 nere] F.E., 1596, 1609; were 1590. (F.E. “ibid.” refers to the wrong page.) III.vii.49.4 devoure] 1596, 1609; devoure: 1590. III.vii.50.2 thurst] 1596, 1609; thrust 1590, Hamilton. III.vii.52.4 is] 1596, 1609; it 1590. III.vii.53.3 ta’ne?] 1596, 1609; ta’ne, 1590; ta’ne. Hamilton. III.vii.53.5 amis.] 1596, 1609; amis, 1590. III.vii.55.4 Three] 1596, 1609; Thre 1590. III.vii.58.3 a do] 1596; adoe 1590; ado 1609. III.vii.61.5 backe] 1596, 1609; bace 1590. III.viii.18.5 said,] 1596, 1609; said 1590. III.viii.23.1 perceiv’d] 1596, 1609; peceiv’d 1590. III.viii.24.5 befell.] 1596, 1609; befell, 1590. III.viii.25.9 rudenes] 1596, 1609; rudenes 1590. III.viii.30.3 frowy] 1590, 1596; frory 1609, Hamilton. III.viii.31.9 so] 1596, 1609; fo 1590. III.viii.37.9 hight] 1596, 1609; high 1590. III.viii.46.9 unworthy] 1596, 1609; unworthy’ 1590, Hamilton. III.viii.50.1 Paridell] 1596, 1609; Pavidell 1590. III.viii.50.6 succeed] 1596, 1609; succed 1590. III.ix.2.4 attone] 1596, 1609; attonce 1590.

Textual Notes III.ix.5.2 supply,] 1590; supply; 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.ix.7.3 misdonne] 1596, 1609; disdonne 1590. III.ix.9.7 hayno us] 1596, 1609; haynous 1590. III.ix.16.9 throw.] 1596, 1609; throw 1590. III.ix.18.7 call.] 1596, 1609; call, 1590. III.ix.20.1 rest,] 1609; rest; 1590, 1596. III.ix.27.5 that] 1596, 1609; with 1590. III.ix.45.3 neck] 1596, 1609; necks 1590. III.ix.47.3 hard] 1590; heard 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.ix.48.9 sayne.] 1596, 1609; sayne 1590. III.x.Arg.2 Malbecco] 1596, 1609; Malbceco 1590. III.x.10.4 drive;] 1596, 1609; drive, 1590. III.x.11.7 told.] 1596, 1609; told, 1590. III.x.13.3 before,] 1596, 1609; before. 1590. III.x.14.8 place;] 1596, 1609; place, 1590. III.x.17.6 despight;] 1596, 1609; despight, 1590. III.x.32.1 more] 1596, 1609; mote 1590. III.x.40.3 wastefull] 1596, 1609; faithfull 1590. III.x.45.8 fedd,] 1609; fedd. 1590, 1596. III.x.46.4 abound.] 1596, 1609; abound, 1590. III.x.46.5 grownd] 1596, 1609; grownd. 1590.

461

III.x.51.9 wonne.] 1596, 1609; wonne 1590. III.xi.Arg.4 exprest.] 1596, 1609; exprest, 1590. III.xi.2.3 golden] 1609; golding 1590, 1596. III.xi.7.6 off] 1596, 1609; of 1590. III.xi.9.6 hast thou,] 1609; hast, thou 1590, 1596. III.xi.14.3 grace some] 1596, 1609; gracesome 1590. III.xi.19.7 dy.] 1596, 1609; dy, 1590. III.xi.23.3 dempt,] 1596, 1609; dempt. 1590. III.xi.27.7 entred] 1596, 1609; decked 1590, Hamilton. III.xi.31.3 And] 1596, 1609; Ant 1590. III.xi.33.7 entire;] 1596, 1609; entire, 1590. III.xi.36.7 thee] 1596, 1609; the 1590. III.xi.39.6 each] 1596, 1609; his 1590, Hamilton. III.xi.39.8 Stag] Smith (citing Jortin); Hag 1590, 1596, 1609. III.xi.43.4 prove,)] Smith; prove. 1590; prove.) 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.xi.50.2 sted,] 1609; sted 1590, 1596. III.xi.50.4 over-red] 1590; over-red,] 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.xii.7.8 wood] 1596, 1609; word 1590. III.xii.9.3 other] 1609; others 1590, 1596. III.xii.11.4 shade;] 1596, 1609; shade, 1590. III.xii.12.3 to] 1596, 1609; too 1590. III.xii.18.7 had,] Hamilton; had 1590, 1596; had: 1609. III.xii.18.8 Bee;] 1596, 1609; Bee, 1590.

462

Textual Notes

III.xii.18.9 degree.] 1596, 1609; degree 1590. III.xii.21.8 still] 1596, 1609; skill 1590. III.xii.23.5 right hand] F.E., 1609; right 1590, 1596. (F.E. “502” refers to the wrong page.) III.xii.28.1 there] 1609; their 1590, 1596. III.xii.34.4 her] 1609; him 1590, 1596. III.xii.38.9 grownd.] 1596; grownd, 1590; ground: 1609. III.xii.39.4 deed;] 1590; deed? 1596, 1609, Hamilton. III.xii.40.6 Lady] 1596, 1609; Lad 1590. III.xii.42.2 She] F.E., 1596, 1609; He 1590. III.xii.42.4 She] F.E., 1596, 1609; He 1590. III.xii.42.5 her] F.E., 1596, 1609; him 1590. IV.i.7.9 excesse.] 1609; excesse 1596. IV.i.20.3 amisse:] 1609; amisse, 1596. IV.i.38.5 ply] 1609; ply. 1596. IV.i.46.1 knight,] 1609; knight 1596. IV.i.51.5 rotten.] 1609; rotten, 1596. IV.ii.6.8 torne;] 1609; torne 1596. IV.ii.13.2 by day;] 1609; by day, 1596. IV.ii.22.2 Florimell.] 1609; Florimell, 1596. IV.ii.22.4 tell.] 1609; tell, 1596. IV.ii.23.8 state.] 1609; state, 1596. IV.ii.44.4 creature,] 1609; creature: 1596. IV.ii.46.9 stout.] 1609; stout 1596. IV.ii.50.9 came.] 1609; came 1596. IV.ii.51.5 Fond dame] Smith; fond dame 1596; Fond Dame 1609.

IV.iii.Arg.2 Canacee:] Smith; Canacee 1596; Canacee. 1609. IV.iii.6.3 worth,] 1609; worth: 1596. IV.iii.7.4 skill] 1609; sill 1596. IV.iii.8.4 disadvaunce:] 1609; disadvaunce, 1596. IV.iii.9.6 n’ote] 1609; not 1596, Hamilton. IV.iii.26.1 blowes:] 1609; blowes, 1596. IV.iii.50.3 To] 1609; Too 1596. IV.iv.1.4 depends,] Smith; depends. 1596; depends; 1609. IV.iv.9.5 sight] 1609; sight. 1596. IV.iv.10.5 worse] 1609; worst 1596. IV.iv.21.5 Paliumord] 1596; Palimord 1609, Hamilton. IV.iv.22.4 affray,] 1609; affray. 1596. IV.iv.23.5 glode,] 1609; glode. 1596. IV.iv.24.4 guide,] 1609; guide. 1596. IV.iv.24.5 side,] 1609; side. 1596. IV.iv.27.3 behalve,] 1609; behalve. 1596. IV.iv.27.8 misdid,] Smith; misdid: 1596; misdid; 1609. IV.iv.27.9 fight.] 1609; fight 1596. IV.iv.34.6 makes;] 1609; makes. 1596. IV.v.25.1 aviz’d,] 1609; aviz’d: 1596. IV.v.25.5 one] 1609; once 1596. IV.v.31.3 his] 1609; her 1596. IV.v.38.8 heare:] 1609; heare, 1596. IV.vi.28.6 He] 1609; Her 1596. IV.vi.31.5 withstand.] 1609; withstand 1596. IV.vi.46.4 mind,] 1609; mind. 1596. IV.vii.25.1 Which] 1609; With 1596. IV.vii.34.1 sad] 1609; said 1596. IV.vii.36.8 faith,] 1609; faith 1596. IV.viii.2.9 decay;] 1609; decay 1596. IV.viii.30.4 then] 1609; them 1596.

Textual Notes IV.viii.38.2 flie,] Hamilton; flie 1596; flie; 1609. IV.ix.Arg.3 Knights,] 1609; Knights 1596. IV.ix.1.8 vertuous] 1609; vertues 1596. IV.ix.3.7 trustie Squire] 1609; Trustie squire 1596. IV.ix.9.6 Pœana] 1596, 1609; Pæana Hamilton. IV.ix.13.2 Pœana] 1596, 1609; Pæana Hamilton. IV.ix.17.5 quest] Smith; guest 1596, 1609. IV.ix.18.8 represse,] 1609; represse. 1596. IV.ix.24.4 straid] 1596, 1609; straid, Smith, Hamilton. IV.ix.26.1 There] 1609; Their 1596. IV.ix.30.8 repayed] 1609; repayred 1596. IV.ix.35.9 repeat;] 1609; repeat. 1596; repeat, Hamilton. IV.x.7.9 ancient] 1609; ancients 1596. IV.x.19.1 meanest] 1609; nearest 1596. IV.x.25.1 alleyes] 1609; all eyes 1596. IV.x.27.1 Hyllus] 1596; Hylus 1609; Hylas Smith, Hamilton. IV.x.36.3 Love] 1609; love 1596. IV.x.37.9 May] 1609; may 1596. IV.x.58.1 Daunger] Smith; daunger 1596, 1609, Hamilton. IV.xi.23.7 Agæan] 1596, 1609; Ægæan Smith, Hamilton.

463

IV.xi.24.4 became,] 1609; became; 1596. IV.xi.34.5 Grant] Smith; Guant 1596, 1609. IV.xi.35.7 Nene] 1596, 1609; Nene Smith, Hamilton. IV.xi.40.5 see?] 1609; see. 1596. IV.xi.41.8 Allo] 1596, 1609; Allo Smith, Hamilton. IV.xi.41.9 Mulla] 1596, 1609; Mulla Smith, Hamilton. IV.xi.48.8 Eudore] Smith; Endore 1596, 1609. IV.xi.52.4 upbinde,] 1609; upbinde. 1596. IV.xii.5.4 none,] 1609; none. 1596. IV.xii.5.5 bemone.] 1609; bemone, 1596. IV.xii.18.3 seeing, Marinell] 1609; seeing Marinell, 1596. IV.xii.21.1. th’earnest] 1590; th’heedfull 1596. IV.xii.23.6. Hydraes] 1596; Hydres 1590. IV.xii.32.4. That] 1590; Thou 1596. IV.xii.39.8. upstaring] 1590; upstarting 1596. IV.xii.48.7. of this] 1596; oft his 1590. IV.xii.51.1. Therewith] 1590; Thereto 1596. IV.xii.61.8. fearefully] 1590; tenderly 1596. IV.xii.75.5. Lady’] 1590; Ladie 1596. IV.xii.81.4. that] 1590; the 1596. IV.xii.83.7. spoyle] 1590; spoyld 1596.

GLOSSARY abie: See aby(e).

approve: Prove; demonstrate; test.

abraid, abrayd, abray: Startle awake; burst into motion. All three forms serve as both present and past tenses.

aread, ared, areed: See read. assay: V.: assail; put to the test; examine; try out; attempt; n.: tested worth; attempt; test.

abroad, abrode: Outside; far and wide; openly.

assoyle: Set free; acquit; absolve; purge.

aby(e): Endure; pay the penalty; abide.

attonce: At once.

address(e): Direct, turn.

attone: In concord; together.

admire, admyre: Marvel at.

avise: See advise.

advise: Consider; consult each other about; remind.

ay: Always, forever; ever. band: Bond.

affray: Frighten.

bay: The point at which a hunted animal has no choice but to turn and face its pursuer.

affret: Attack. agrise; agrize: Shudder; be horrified; horrify.

be-: A prefix that may either intensify a verb or make an intransitive verb transitive.

albe, allbee, all be: Although; even if. algates: Always; by any means; at any rate; altogether; nevertheless.

beheast; behest: Command; promise. behight: Name; consider, esteem; promise; hold out hope; grant; command.

als: Also. amaine, amayne: Mightily, vigorously.

behove: Befit, be appropriate for; be useful for.

amate: Overwhelm; dismay; confound.

beldame: Elderly woman, literally “grandmother.”

ap(p)all: Trans. v.: make pale or feeble with pity; check; quell; intimidate; intrans. v.: become pale or dim; lose heart; fail in strength.

bend: Aim. beseeme: Suit, be appropriate for; look well on. bestad(d), bestedde: Past part.: beset; assailed from all sides; pres. tense: assist.

apply: Direct, steer; prepare; employ; follow.

464

Glossary

bewray: Betray, reveal (what was hidden). boot(e): Avail; profit. bountie, bounty: Goodness, virtue. brasen: Brass; firm and strong. brave: Resplendent. brenne, brent: Burn, burnt. buxome: Favorable; welcoming; yielding. can: Gan, did; know; is or are able. careful: Sorrowing; burdened with cares. cast: Aim, direct; resolve; plan; attempt; consider. caytive: Captive; vile; wretched (to call someone a “slave” or “caytive” was a serious insult— unless, of course, that someone was literally and unfairly imprisoned). certes: Certainly. charet: Chariot. choler: Anger (literally bile, one of the four humors, associated with heat and thought to cause irascibility). clep, cleep: Call. close: Adj.: secret; private; near; adv.: secretly; privately; close by. corage, courage: The heart as the source of emotion and thought; spirit; sexual vigor. corse: Body; corpse.

465

couch: N.: bed; v.: crouch; lower (a weapon) to the position for attack. courage: See corage. courtesie, courtesy, curtesie: Not only courtesy in the modern sense, but the whole panoply of good manners, talents, and virtues to which any knight, lord, or lady serving at court was supposed to aspire. The lower classes were not usually considered capable of true courtesy, although humanists gestured toward the idea that education was as important as lineage in determining noble virtue. crest: Helmet; crest on a helmet. crew: Group; bunch; gang; mob. dainty: Delightful; precious; choice; fastidious; careful. Dan: Courtesy title for a male member of a religious order or for a male scholar, knight, poet, or deity; Spenser uses the title only for deities, except when applying it to Chaucer. darraine, darrayne: Prepare for battle; set up a battle formation; marshal forces; maintain a battle challenge. date: Term; term of life; time of death. deare: Adj.: precious; severe; earnest; beloved; adv.: with great cost; severely; earnestly; lovingly.

466

Glossary

decay: Destroy; waste away; weaken; die.

eft: A second time; again; back; moreover; likewise.

deem(e): Form an opinion, consider; ajudge; pass judgment; sentence or condemn; decree; think (of someone or something); expect, hope; surmise; proclaim.

eftsoones: Afterwards; soon afterwards.

degree: Social rank; level; amount. desert: Deserted place; wilderness. despight: Contempt. dight: Appoint, ordain; place; put in order, make ready; dress, don armor. Past participle has the same form. discolour(e)d: Multicolored. discover: Disclose. disdaine: N.: contempt; indignation; v.: contemn; feel indignation toward. dismaid: Having lost all moral courage; defeated; appalled; discouraged; made badly. Often also a pun on “made no longer a maid,” i.e., deflowered.

eke: Also. elfe: Inhabitant of Faerie Land (whether good or evil); malignant imp. embay: Steep; soak; bathe; plunge. emprize: Enterprise. endyte, endite: Indite, compose in words; dictate. engin(e): Machination; plot; wicked tool. ensample: Example. envie, envy: V.: deny; begrudge, malevolently withhold; admire (with overtones of feeling mortified at being less admirable oneself); n.: malevolent grudging; admiration (with overtones of mortification at one’s own inferiority). ere: Before; ever. erst: See earst.

dole, doole: Grief; lamentation.

estate: State, condition, fortune.

dolor, dolour: Grief.

faine, fayne: V.: desire, wish; feign; adv.: gladly; adj.: desirous.

doubt, dout: N.: fear; suspicion; wonder; v.: fear; suspect; wonder. doughtie, doughty: Valiant. drerihed(d): Dreariness. earst: Previously.

fay: Fairy (not a diminutive being, but a supernatural creature, outwardly resembling a human, living in a world that resembles and overlaps that of mortals).

Glossary

fell: Adj.: cruel, dire; n.: animosity, resentment. (From the Latin fello, felon). flood: Body of water. fond: Adj.: foolish; v.: found. for thy: Therefore; because.

467

hardiment: Hardihood; strength. hauberk, hauberque, hawberk: Chain-mail tunic. hew: N.: form, appearance; condition; color; v.: cut down.

fordonne: Destroyed; exhausted; made powerless.

hight: Call, name; pledge.

forlore: Abandoned.

humour: Moisture; state of mind; one of four chief fluids of the body, which were believed to determine each person’s physical and mental constitution by their balance or imbalance: blood, phlegm, choler or yellow bile, and melancholy or black bile—causing sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric, and melancholy temperaments.

froward: Adverse; inimical; uncooperative, untoward; counter to what is reasonable or desirable. gan, gin: Began, begin. gentle: Of gentle birth (by the late sixteenth century an indeterminate category including some commoners who owned land and were considered by their neighbors to be persons of good breeding, but also including all people with titles); having the virtues appropriate to one of gentle birth. gest: Exploit; romance tale; demeanor. ghost: Soul; spirit. girdle: Sash (not an undergarment). giust: Joust. grace: Favor; kindness; mercy. griesly: Grisly, causing horror. grudge: Complain. guerdon: Reward, recompense. haberjeon: Habergeron, chainmail tunic (sometimes sleeveless).

his: His; its.

imp: Offspring, son or daughter; scion; grafted shoot. in place: There; here. issue: Offspring. jolly: Sprightly; gallant; brave; splendid; pleasant; handsome; lustful; overweeningly self-confident. kind, kynd: Type; nature. kindly, kyndly: According to type; according to nature, innate. late: Adj.: old; advanced; tardy; recent; adv.: tardily; recently. launch: Lance; pierce. least: Lest. leman: Beloved; lover, paramour; mistress.

468

Glossary

lever: Comparative of lief. lewd: Ignorant; evil; unchaste. lief(e): V.: rather, prefer; wish; like; adj.: dear. lightly: Nimbly; easily; quickly; carelessly. list: Intrans. v.: be inclined to, wish to do; trans. v.: please (someone or oneself). loose: Adj.: wanton; intemperate; frivolous; v.: loosen; solve; lose. loure, lowre: Scowl. lout, lowt: Bow. lust: Pleasure; liking; inclination; desire; sexual appetite; immoderate sexual desire; vigor. lusty: Lively; beautiful; full of sexual appetite; vigorous; arrogant.

meet(e): Adj.: fit, appropriate; v.: be in agreement; blend. mesprise: Mistake; offense; contempt; failure to recognize someone’s worth; slander. mickle: Much. mischance: Ill success; bad luck. misfare: Misfortune; misfaring: transgression. mishap: Misfortune. mister: Sort, kind, type (of). moniment: Monument, memorial; evidence; mark. mote: Might. ne: Nor. ne . . . ne: Neither . . . nor. nice: Fastidious; choosy. niceness: Luxury; delicacy.

magnify: Extol.

nie, nigh: Near; nearly.

maide, mayd: Virgin; unmarried woman (presumed virginal).

nor . . . nor: Neither . . . nor.

maile, mayle: Chain mail.

ought: Aught, anything; at all.

maine, mayne: Sea; force.

paine, payne: Labor, trouble; hurt.

make: N.: mate; v.: most of the modern meanings of the word. maugre, maulgre: Despite; “a curse upon!” mean(e): Adj.: inferior; base; low; middling; n.: middle; common ground; v.: intend. meat: Food. meed(e): Reward; gain; repayment.

or . . . or: Either . . . or.

paramour: Lover, sexual partner. pas, passe: Surpass. passing: Surpassing; surpassingly. paynim: Pagan; non-Christian (therefore designating not only pagans but also Muslims and sometimes Jews).

Glossary

perdy, perdee, perdie: Mild oath, literally “by God” (French par dieu).

469

reft: Bereft; stolen; ripped; split. relent: Yield, slacken.

perforce: Of necessity; by force.

repair: Go to a place, to stay there for a while.

pight: Placed; set up.

ribbands: Ribbons.

place, in: There; here.

rive: Cleave.

plaine: Complain. plaint: Complaint.

rude: Rustic, crude, uncivilized; turbulent, disorderly.

plight: Condition, state.

ruth: Compassion; remorse.

port: Carriage (of oneself); demeanor.

salvage: Savage, wild.

pray: N.: prey; booty; v.: pray, prey upon.

satyr: Half-man, half-goat. Known for lechery. The god of satyrs is Pan, who plays a flute.

preace, preas(s)e, press: Crowd, throng.

scu(t)chi(o)n: Shield.

prick: Spur on one’s horse, ride swiftly; puncture.

semblance: Deceitful appearance; show; resemblance; demeanor; appearance.

privy: Secret; private; in on a secret. prove: Test by experience; bring about an effect. puissance: Might, power; potency. purpose: Conversation; intent. raught: Reached. read: Read; discern, see; understand; interpret; predict; prophesy; guess; believe; name; identify; declare; teach; advise; decree. recoure: Recover. recure: Recover; restore; ameliorate; heal. redresse: Reparation; remedy; aid; relief; restoration.

sell: Seat; saddle.

semblaunt: Appearance; demeanor; deceitful appearance; likeness. sew: Pursue; follow; attend upon; take as a guide; court; apply to for favor. shade: Shadow; unsubstantial image; spirit; reflection. shadow: See shade. sheene: Bright; beautiful. shend (past tense shent): Disgrace. shivered: Shattered. shivering: Quivering; capable of splitting something (said of a spear or dart). silly: Helpless; innocent.

470

Glossary

sith: Since (the time that); given that.

sway: Power, force.

sithens: See sith.

swain: Young man; farm laborer; suitor.

sleight, slight: Cunning trick.

swownd: Swoon.

smart: Pain.

teen(e): See tine.

sore: Adj.: painful, severe; adv.: painfully, severely.

then: Than.

souse, sowse: Swoop (like a falcon hunting); pounce.

thereto: Moreover; also.

thence: From there.

speed: N.: success; v.: succeed.

therewithall: In addition to that; besides.

spill: Spoil; destroy.

tho: Then.

spoil(e), spoyle: V.: despoil, plunder; ravage; deprive, rob; n.: booty, trophy.

thral(l): Prisoner; imprisonment.

spright: Spirit. stay: V.: pause; hinder; stop; prop up; n.: stamina; prop. stead: Place; situation. still: Always, constantly. stint: Intrans. v.: cease; trans. v.: put a stop to. stound, stownd: Time of trial; attack; state of stupefaction.

thrill: Pierce. tidings: News. tind, tynd: Ignite (related to “tinder”). tine, tyne: N.: affliction, trouble, sorrow; v.: lose (something); be defeated; waste; forget; destroy; perish. to weet: That is. See also weet.

stout: Proud; brave; hardy.

toy: N.: game; foolishness; v.: play.

stowre, stower: Tumult; time of stress; combat.

trace: V.: track; tread; walk; pursue; travel; dance; n.: path.

strand, strond: Shore.

traine, trayne: N.: entrapment; v.: coach.

streight: Adv.: straightway; closely; adj.: close; narrow; strict. Stygian: Of the river Styx, in the Greek underworld; hellish. succour, succor: Aid; shelter. suffer: Allow. surquedry: Arrogance.

traveile, travell: Toil; labor in childbirth; journey. treat: Talk; parley. uncouth: Unknown; unusual; rude. uneath, uneth: Adv.: scarcely, with difficulty; adj.: difficult.

Glossary

upstaide: Propped up. vaine, vayne: Empty, useless, in vain. villein, villaine, villayn: Originally a serf; by the sixteenth century, it was nearly impossible to tell whether the speaker meant “serf ” or “base-minded wretch,” given that the two social categories were both cause for contempt. want: Lack.

471

whilom(e), whylom(e): While; previously; at some time, once. wight: Person. wist: Know; knew. withal, withall: In addition, moreover. won: Was wont, was accustomed. wonne: N.: dwelling place; v.: dwell, abide.

wanton: Undisciplined, wild; frisky; full of life; unchaste; extravagant; frivolous.

wont: N.: habit; adj.: accustomed; adv.: usually.

weede: Clothing; undesirable plant.

wox(e): Past tense of wax or wex.

weene: Believe; expect.

wracke: Wreck; ruin; violence.

weet: Know; discover. See also to weet.

y: Often begins past-tense verbs, e.g., “ymett” for “met.”

wend: Travel.

yclep: See clep.

wex(e): Wax, grow.

yfere: Companionably; together.

whileare, whilere, whyleare: Erewhile, previously; lately.

wonted: Usual, habitual.

yode: Went.

INDEX OF CHARACTERS Appearances of, and some references to, major characters in Books Three and Four are listed. In parentheses are appearances in other books. This index is indebted to Shohachi Fukuda’s “The Characters of The Faerie Queene” in Hamilton. Acrasia, III.i.2 (II.i.51–55; II.ii.44;

Belphoebe, III.Pr.5; v.Arg., 27–vi.10, 26–28; IV.vii.Arg., 23–viii.18 (II.iii.21–42) Blandamour, IV.i.Arg., 32–ii.29; iv.2–19, 45; v.13–27; ix.20–37

v.26–38; vi.9; xii.72–86)

Adonis, III.i.34; vi.Arg., 46–49 Æmylia, IV.vii.10–20, 33–34; viii.19–36, 50–64; ix.9 Agape, IV.ii.Arg., 41–53; iii.40 Amoret, III.vi.Arg., 4–29, 51–53; xi.10–24; xii.Arg., 30–47a, 30–45b; IV.i.1–17, 49; v.13–30; vi.34–38, 46–47; vii.Arg., 2–35; viii.19–37; ix.17–20, 38–40; x.Arg., 8, 52–58 Amphisa, III.vi.4 Amyas, IV.vii.15–18; viii.50–64; ix.4–11 Apollo, IV.xii.25 Archimago, III.iv.45 (I.i.Arg,

(V.ix.41)

Braggadocchio, III.viii.11–18; x.20–54; IV.iv.8–21; v.23–27 (II. iii.4–46; V.iii.10–39)

Brianor, IV.iv.40 Britomart, III passim; IV passim (V.vi.3–viii.3)

Bruncheval, IV.iv.17–18 Busirane, III.xi–xii Cambello (Cambell), IV.ii.30–41; iii.Arg., 3–52; iv.13, 27–36, 44; v.10 Cambina, IV.ii.31; iii.Arg., 38–iv.5; v.10 Canacee, IV.ii.30–iii.52; v.10 Care, IV.v.32–45 Chrysogone, III.vi.4–10, 26–27 Claribell, IV.ix.20–41 Columbell, III.vii.53–61 Concord, IV.x.31–36 Corflambo, IV.viii.Arg., 38–ix.8 Cupid, III.i.39; ii.26; iii.1–3; vi.11–26, 49–50; x.5; xi.47–49; xii.Arg., 22–23; IV.x.42 (I.Pr.3;

29–55; ii.2–11; iii.24–39; vi.34–48; xii.24–36; II.i.1–25; iii.11–19; vi.47–51; viii.10–22, 56)

Argante, III.vii.37–52; xi.3–4 Artegall, III.ii.Arg., 8–26; iii.24–28, 62; iv.4; IV.iv.39–46; v.8–9, 21; vi.2–46 (II.ix.6; V passim; VI.i.4–10)

Arthur, III.i.1–18; iv.Arg., 45–v.12; IV.vii.42–47; viii.Arg., 18–ix.37 (I.vii.29–ix.20; II.viii.17–xi.49; V.viii.4–xi.35; VI.v.11–viii.30)

II.viii.6; ix.34;VI.vii.32–37; VII.vii.34)

Ate, IV.i.17–32, 47–54; ii.3–19; iv.2–12; v.22–23, 30–31; ix.24

Cymodoce (also known as Cymoent), III.iv.19–43; IV.xi.53; xii.3, 19–33 Daunger, IV.x.16–20 Delay, IV.x.13–15

(II.vii.55; V.ix.47.)

Bacchante, III.i.20–45 Basciante, III.i.20–45 472

Index of Characters

Diamond, IV.ii.41–iii.24 Diana, III.vi.16–28; IV.x.30 (I.vii.4–5; VII.vi.38–55)

Doubt, IV.x.11–14 Druon, IV.ix.20–41 Duessa, IV.i.Arg., 17–19, 31–32; v.11 (I.ii.13–45; iv.2–3, 13–15, 37–51; v.2–51; vii.1–18; viii.5–50; xii.24–36; II.i.8–30; V.ix.36–50; x.4)

Dumarin, III.iv.19–20 Dwarf, Florimell’s, III.v.3–12 (V.ii.2–10)

Dwarf, Pœana’s, IV.viii.54–62; ix.5, 8 Faerie Queene (also known as Gloriana and Tanaquill), III.Pr.5; i.2; ii.3; iv.3, 54; IV.iv.17 (I.i.3; vii.36, 46–47; ix.13–16; x.58–59; xi.7; xii.18, 41; II.i.1, 28; ii.40–43; v.11; viii.43; ix.2–6; x.70–76; V.i.3–4; viii.3; xi.37; xii.3; VI.x.1, 4, 28; xii.12)

Fates, IV.ii.47–53 Ferramont, IV.iv.19–21 Ferrau (Ferraugh), III.viii.15–19; IV.ii.4–7; iv.8 Fisher, III.vii.27; viii.20–31 Florimell, III.i.Arg., 15–18; iv.Arg., 45–53; v.Arg., 4–12, 23; vi.54; vii.Arg., 1–36, 61; viii.20–52; IV.ii.25–28; IV.iv.Arg.; v.2–6; xi.1–5; xii.Arg., 5–11, 27–35. (V.ii.2–4; iii.14–27.)

Florimell, False (Snowy Florimell), III.viii.Arg., 5–19; IV.ii.Arg., 3–19; iv.7–11; v.13–27 (V.iii.17–26) Forester (Foster), III.i.17–18; iv.47; v.15–25 Gardante, III.i.20–45

473

Genius, III.vi.31–33 Glauce, III.ii.30–52; iii.5–25, 51–62; iv.11; xii.44–45a; IV.i.50–54; ii.3; v.31–33; vi.25–32 Gloriana, See Faerie Queene Graces, III.vi.2; IV.v.5 (II.viii.6; VI.x.9–24)

Guyon, III.Arg., 1–18; iv.45–46 (II passim; V.iii.29–37)

Hellenore, III.ix.25–32, 52; x.Arg., 4–17, 35–52 Hyena, III.vii.22–38; viii.49 Jocante, III.i.20–45 Liagore, III.iv.29–43 Lust, IV.vii.Arg., 4–32 Malbecco, III.ix.Arg., 3–32, 53; x.5–60 Malecasta, III.i.20–67 Marinell, III.iv.Arg., 12–44; v.8–10; vi.54; viii.46; IV.xi.Arg., 5–7, 53; xii.3–35 (V.iii.2–26)

Medway, IV.Arg., xi.8–53 Merlin, III.ii.18–21; iii.Arg., 6–50, 62; iv.11 (I.vii.36; ix.5; II.viii.20)

Mnemon, III.ix.47–51 Neptune, IV.xi.11; xii.29–32 Nereides, IV.xi.48–52 Noctante, III.i.20–45 Ollyphant (Olliphant), III.vii.48; xi.Arg.; 3–7 Palladine, III.vii.37, 43–44, 52–53 Palmer, III.i.9–11 (II.i.7, 31–34, 57–60; ii.5–11, 43; iv.2–11, 34–35; v.24; vi.19–20; viii.3–54; xii.3–87)

Panope, III.viii.37–38 Paridell, III.viii.Arg., 44–x.16, 35–8; IV.i.17, 32–43; ii.Arg., 7–29; iv.19; v.11, 24; ix.20–37

474

Index of Characters

Parlante, III.i.20–45 Phoebe, See Diana Phoebus, See Apollo Placidas, IV.viii.Arg., 38–ix.16 Pleasure, III.vi.51–52 Pœana, IV.viii.49–61; ix.6–16 Priamond, IV.ii.41–iii.24 Proteus, III.iv.25; viii.Arg., 29–42; IV.xi.Arg., 2–4, 9; xii.28–33 Psyche, III.vi.51–52 Redcrosse (Red Crosse), III.i.20–30, 63–67; ii.Arg., 8–16; iii.62; iv.4–5 (I passim; II.i.23–35; V.xi.53)

Salvage Knight, See Artegall Sangliere, IV.iv.40 (V.i.14–29) Satyrane, III.vii.Arg., 29–61; viii.43–ix.17, 27; x.1; xi.3–6; IV.ii.25–27; iv.Arg., 15–44; v.7, 22–26 (I.vi.20–47) Satyrs, III.x.Arg., 43–53 (I.vi.7–19) Sclaunder, IV.viii.Arg., 23–36

Snowy Florimell, See Florimell, False Squire of Dames, III.vii.Arg., 37–61; viii.44–51; ix.3–6; IV.ii.20–31; v.18 Thames, IV.xi.Arg., 8–53 Timias, III.i.18; iv.47; v.Arg., 12–50; IV.vii.23–viii.18. (I.vii.37; viii.3–29; II.viii.17; ix.11; xi.29–31, 48; VI.v.11–vi.16; vii.39–49; viii.5–27.

Triamond, IV.ii.41–iii.52; iv.20–45; v.10, 21 Trompart, III.x.23–54 (II.iii.6–44; V.iii.17, 38)

Tryphon, IV.xi.6–7 Venus, III.i.34; vi.11–29; 46–51; IV.x.Arg., 29–52 Witch, III.vii. 6–23; viii.Arg., 1–10 Witch’s son, III.vii.Arg., 12–21; viii.3–13 Womanhood, IV.x.52–55

WORKS CITED Because the Introduction and footnotes for this volume are designed primarily to motivate readers to form their own interpretations, some strong works of Spenserian literary criticism focusing on Books Three and Four have not been cited and therefore do not appear below. The works cited below are all recommended reading, but the scholar can find a great deal of additional useful material by searching the MLA Bibliography Online and Early English Books Online, available through most university library Web sites. Adelman, Janet. “Re: Question about Fetal Nourishment.” E-mail to the editor. February 1, 2006. Alciati, Andreas Alciatus. The Latin Emblems. Vol. 1 of Index Emblematicus. 1531. Edited by Peter M. Daly and Virginia W. Callahan. 2 vols. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1985. Alpers, Paul. The Poetry of The Faerie Queene. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1967. Reprinted, Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1982. Anderson, Judith H. “‘In Liuing Colours and Right Hew’: The Queen of Spenser’s Central Books.” In Poetic Traditions of the English Renaissance. Edited by Maynard Mack and George de Forest Lord. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982, 47–66. Ariosto, Ludovico. Orlando Furioso. Edited by Marcello Turchi and Edoardo Sanguineti. Italy: Garzanti, 1982. Baker, David J. Between Nations: Shakespeare, Spenser, Marvell, and the Question of Britain. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997. Berger, Harry, Jr. “Two Spenserian Retrospects: The Antique Temple of Venus and the Primitive Marriage of Rivers.” Revisionary Play: Studies in the Spenserian Dynamics. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. Berry, Craig. “‘Sundrie Doubts’: Vulnerable Understanding and Dubious Origins in Spenser’s Continuation of the Squire’s Tale.” In Refiguring Chaucer in the Renaissance. Edited by Theresa M. Krier. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1998, 106–27. Boccaccio, Giovanni. Genealogiae. 1494. The Renaissance and the Gods Series. New York: Garland Publishing, 1976. Boiardo, Matteo Maria. Orlando Innamorato. Translated and edited by Charles Stanley Ross and Anne Finnigan. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. Booth, Stephen, ed. Shakespeare’s Sonnets. By William Shakespeare. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977.

475

476

Works Cited

Bray, Alan. “Homosexuality and the Signs of Male Friendship in Elizabethan England.” In Queering the Renaissance. Edited by Jonathan Goldberg. Q Series. Durham: Duke University Press, 1994, 40–61. Camden, William. De Connubio Tamae et Isis. Excerpted in Britannia. London: R. Newbery, 1586. Castiglione, Baldassare. The Book of the Courtier. Translated by Sir Thomas Hoby, 1561. Introduced by J. H. Whitfield. London: J. M. Dent and Sons, 1975. Translation of Il Libro del Cortegiano, 1528. Cavanagh, Sheila T. Wanton Eyes and Chaste Desires: Female Sexuality in The Faerie Queene. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994. Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Works of Geoffrey Chaucer. 2nd ed. Edited by F[red] N[orris] Robinson. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1961. Collier, J[ohn] Payne, ed. The Works of Edmund Spenser. By Edmund Spenser. 5 vols. London: Bell and Daldy, 1862. Comes, Natalis. Mythologiae sive Explicationum Fabularum. Venice, 1568. Eggert, Katherine. Showing Like a Queen: Female Authority and Literary Experiment in Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000. Fowler, Alastair. “Six Knights at Castle Joyous.” Studies in Philology 56 (1959): 583–99. ––––. “Spenser and War.” In War, Literature and the Arts in Sixteenth-Century Europe. Edited by J. R. Mulryne and Margaret Shewring. London: St. Martin’s Press, 1989, 147–64. Fowler, Elizabeth. Literary Character: The Human Figure in Early English Writing. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003. Fraunce, Abraham. The Lamentations of Amyntas. 1587. In Thomas Watson’s Latin Amyntas. Edited by Franklin M. Dickey. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967, 1–99. Geoffrey of Monmouth. British History. C. 1135. In Six Old English Chronicles. Edited by J[ohn] A[llen] Giles. London: G. Bell, 1891, 89–292. Goldberg, Jonathan. Endlesse Worke: Spenser and the Structures of Discourse. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981. Greenlaw, Edwin, et al., eds. The Works of Edmund Spenser:A Variorum Edition. By Edmund Spenser. 11 vols. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1932–1957. Grosart, Alexander Balloch, ed. The Complete Works in Verse and Prose of Edmund Spenser. By Edmund Spenser. 9 vols. London: Spenser Society, 1882–1884. Renascence Editions:An Online Repository of Works Printed in English Between the Years 1477 and 1799. Published by Risa Stephanie Bear. 1992–2005. May 30, 2006. http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/ren.htm.

Works Cited

477

Gross, Kenneth. “Re: commune food.” E-mail to the editor. February 2, 2006. Guarini, Battista. The Faithful Shepherd: A Translation of Battista Guarini’s Il Pastor Fido. Translated by Thomas Sheridan et al. Newark: University of Delaware Press, 1989. Hadfield, Andrew. “The Faerie Queene, Books IV–VII.” In The Cambridge Companion to Spenser. Edited by Hadfield. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001, 124–42. ––––. Shakespeare, Spenser and the Matter of Britain. Early Modern Literature in History Series. Houndmills, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. Hamilton, A[lbert] C., Hiroshi Yamashita, and Toshiyuki Suzuki, eds. The Faerie Queene. By Edmund Spenser. Harlow, England: Longman, 2001. Hardyng, John. The Chronicle of John Hardyng. 1543. Edited by Henry Ellis. London, F. C. and J. Rivington, 1812. Facsimile New York: AMS Press, 1974. Harington, Sir John, trans. Orlando Furioso. By Ludovico Ariosto. 1591. Edited by Robert McNulty. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1972. Helgerson, Richard. Forms of Nationhood: The Elizabethan Writing of England. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. Hesiod. Theogony and Works and Days. Translated by M[artin] L[itchfield] West. World’s Classics Series. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990. Holinshed, Raphael. Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland. 1577, revised 1587. Edited by Henry Ellis et al. 6 vols. London: J. Johnson, 1807–1808. Hough, Graham. A Preface to The Faerie Queene. New York: Norton, 1963. Hyginus. Fabulae. Edited by Peter K. Marshall. Bibliotheca scriptorum Graecorum et Romanorum Teubneriana. Monachii: in aedibus K.G. Saur, 2002. Jortin, John. Remarks on Spenser’s Poems. London: J. Whiston, 1734. Facsimile New York: Garland, 1970. Kahf, Mohja. Western Representations of the Muslim Woman: From Termagant to Odalisque. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999. Kaplan, M. Lindsay. The Culture of Slander in Early Modern England. Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture 19. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997. Leland, John. Kykneion Asma / Cygnea Cantio. London: R. Wolfe, 1545. Lucretius Carus, Titus. On the Nature of Things / De Rerum Natura. Edited and translated by Anthony M. Esolen. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995. Malory, Sir Thomas. Le Morte D’Arthur. London: J. M. Dent, 1906. McCabe, Richard A. Spenser’s Monstrous Regiment: Elizabethan Ireland and the Poetics of Difference. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

478

Works Cited

McCoy, Richard C. The Rites of Knighthood: The Literature and Politics of Elizabethan Chivalry. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989. Miller, David Lee. “Re: Footnotes.” E-mail to the editor. March 6, 2006. ––––. “Gender, Justice, and the Gods in The Faerie Queene, Book 5.” In Reading Renaissance Ethics. Edited by Marshall Grossman. New York: Routledge, 2007. Montrose, Louis Adrian. “A Midsummer Night’s Dream and the Shaping Fantasies of Elizabethan Culture: Gender, Power, Form.” In Rewriting the Renaissance: The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe. Edited by Margaret W. Ferguson et al. Women in Culture and Society Series. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986, 65–87. Mueller, Martin, et al. Wordhoard:An Application for the Close Reading and Scholarly Analysis of Deeply Tagged Literary Texts. Version 1.1. 2006. Northwestern University. http://wordhoard.northwestern.edu. Nelson, William. The Poetry of Edmund Spenser: A Study. New York: Columbia University Press, 1963. Osgood, Charles Grosvenor, ed. A Concordance to the Poems of Edmund Spenser. 2 vols. Philadelphia: Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1915. Ovid. Metamorphoses. 3rd ed. 2 vols. Translated by Frank Justus Miller. Loeb Classical Series. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1977. Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd ed. 1991. Paradise, Jean, Maron L. Wasman, et al., eds. Great Soviet Encyclopedia. 3rd ed. Vol. 22. New York: Macmillan, 1979. Translation of Bol’shaia Sovetskaia Entsiklopediia. Edited by Prokhorov, A. M., et al. 3rd ed. Vol. 22. Moscow: Sovetskaia Engsiklopediia Publishing House, 1945. Parker, Patricia. Literary Fat Ladies: Rhetoric, Gender, Property. London: Methuen, 1987. Plato. The Dialogues of Plato. Translated by B[enjamin] Jowett. 4th ed. 4 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1953. Pliny, the Elder. Natural History. Translated by H. Rackham et al. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1938–1963. Quitslund, Jon A. Spenser’s Supreme Fiction: Platonic Natural Philosophy and The Faerie Queene. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001. Raleigh, Sir Walter. The Discoverie of the Large, Rich and Bewtiful Empire of Guiana. London: Robert Robinson, 1596. Rambuss, Richard. “Spenser’s Life and Career.” In The Cambridge Companion to Spenser. Edited by Andrew Hadfield. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001, 13–36. ––––. Spenser’s Secret Career. Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture 3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993.

Works Cited

479

Roche, Thomas P. The Kindly Flame. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1964. Roche, Thomas P., and C. Patrick O’Donnell, Jr., eds. Edmund Spenser:The Faerie Queene. By Edmund Spenser. The English Poets Series. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978. Shuger, Debora. “Irishmen, Aristocrats, and Other White Barbarians.” Renaissance Quarterly 50.2 (1997): 494–525. Sidney, Sir Philip. An Apology for Poetry or The Defence of Poesy. Edited by Geoffrey Shepherd. Edinburgh: Nelson, 1967. ––––. Astrophil and Stella. In The Poems of Sir Philip Sidney. Edited by William A. Ringler, Jr. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971. Silberman, Lauren. Transforming Desire: Erotic Knowledge in Books III and IV of The Faerie Queene. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995. Sircy, Jonathan. “All Bondage is Not Created Equally: The Sadistic Institution and Masochistic Contract in The Faerie Queene.” Paper presented at the Spenser’s Civilizations Conference. Toronto: University of Toronto, May 19 2006. Smith, J. C., and E. de Selincourt, eds. Spenser: Poetical Works. By Edmund Spenser. Oxford Standard Authors Series. London: Oxford University Press, 1912. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979. Spenser, Edmund. For editions of the poetical works, see Collier, Greenlaw, Grosart, Hamilton, Mueller, Roche, and Smith. ––––. A View of the Present State of Ireland. Edited by W. L. Renwick. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970. Stallybrass, Peter. “Patriarchal Territories: The Body Enclosed.” In Rewriting the Renaissance:The Discourses of Sexual Difference in Early Modern Europe. Edited by Margaret W. Ferguson et al. Women in Culture and Society Series. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986, 123–42. Steadman, John M. Nature into Myth: Medieval and Renaissance Moral Symbols. Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1979. Stephens, Dorothy. The Limits of Eroticism in Post-Petrarchan Narrative: Conditional Pleasure from Spenser to Marvell. Cambridge Studies in Renaissance Literature and Culture 29. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. Stow, John. Stow’s Survey of London. Introduced by H. B. Wheatley. London: J. M. Dent and Sons, 1980. Tasso, Torquato. Gerusalemme Liberata. Ferrara: Appresso gli heredi di Francesco de Rossi, 1581. ––––. “O bella età de l’oro.” Aminta. 1581. Edited by B. T. Sozzi. Padua: Liviana Editrice, 1957. Chorus to Act I. Translated by Samuel Daniel as “O Happie Golden Age.” Works. 1601. In Three Renaissance Pastorals:Tasso, Guarini, Daniel.

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Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies 102. Edited by Elizabeth Story Donno. Binghamton, 1993. Appendix 2, 257–8. Traub, Valerie. “The (In)Significance of ‘Lesbian’ Desire in Early Modern England.” In Queering the Renaissance. Edited by Jonathan Goldberg. Q Series. Durham: Duke University Press, 1994, 62–83. Virgil. Eclogues. In The Singer of the Eclogues: A Study of Virgilian Pastoral. Translated and introduced by Paul Alpers. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1979, 9–63. ––––. Aeneid. Translated by Robert Fitzgerald. 1983. Reprinted, New York: Vintage, 1984. Watkins, John. The Specter of Dido: Spenser and Virgilian Epic. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995. Wordsworth, Dorothy. Journals of Dorothy Wordsworth:The Alfoxden Journal, 1798, the Grasmere Journals, 1800–1803. 2nd ed. Edited by Mary Moorman and Mary Trevelyan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991. Zurcher, Andrew. “Re: Opposite of hyperbole.” E-mail to the editor. January 10, 2006.

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The Faerie Queene from Hackett Publishing Company General Editor, Abraham Stoll Spenser’s great work in five volumes. Each includes its own Introduction, annotation, notes on the text, bibliography, glossary, and index of characters; Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh” and a short Life of Edmund Spenser appear in every volume.

Book Two Edited, with Introduction, by Erik Gray, Columbia University Books Three and Four Edited, with Introduction, by Dorothy Stephens, University of Arkansas Book Five Edited, with Introduction, by Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego

Edmund Spenser

The

Faerie Queene Books Three and Four

BOOKS THREE AND FOUR

Book One Edited, with Introduction, by Carol V. Kaske, Cornell University

The Faerie Queene

These paired Arthurian legends suggest that erotic desire and the desire for companionship undergird national politics. The maiden Britomart, Queen Elizabeth’s fictional ancestor, dons armor to search for a man whom she has seen in a crystal ball. While on this quest, she seeks to understand how one can be chaste while pursuing a sexual goal, in love with a man while passionately attached to a woman, a warrior princess yet a wife. As Spenser’s most sensitively developed character, Britomart is capable of heroic deeds but also of teenage self-pity. Her experience is anatomized in the stories of other characters, where versions of love and friendship include physical gratification, torture, mutual aid, competition, spiritual ecstasy, self-sacrifice, genial teasing, jealousy, abduction, wise government, sedition, and the valiant defense of a pig shed.

SPENSER

The Faerie Queene, Books Three and Four

Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos Edited, with Introduction, by Andrew Hadfield, University of Sussex

90000

Edited, with Introduction, by

FnL1 00 0000

9 780872 208551

HACKETT

ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-855-1 ISBN-10: 0-87220-855-9

0855

DOROTHY STEPHENS

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book Five

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book Five

Edited, with Introduction, by

Abraham Stoll Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. Indianapolis/Cambridge

Copyright © 2006 by Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved 06 07 08 09

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

For further information, please address Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 44937 Indianapolis, IN 46244-0937 www.hackettpublishing.com Cover art: Walter Crane illustration and ornament for Book Five, The Faerie Queene, ca. 1890. Cover design by Abigail Coyle Interior design by Elizabeth Wilson Composition by Professional Book Compositors Printed at Edwards Brothers, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spenser, Edmund, 1552?–1599. The faerie queene / Edmund Spenser. v. cm. Contents: Book one / edited, with introduction, by Carol Kaske — Book five / edited, with introduction, by Abraham Stoll Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-87220-808-7 (bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-807-9 (pbk. : bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-802-8 (bk. 5) — ISBN 0-87220-801-X (pbk. : bk. 5) 1. Knights and knighthood—Poetry. 2. Epic poetry, English. 3. Virtues —Poetry. I. Kaske, Carol V., 1933– II. Stoll, Abraham Dylan, 1969– III. Title.

PR2358.A3K37 2006 821'.3—dc22 2005026668 ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-802-5 (cloth : bk. 5); ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-801-8 (pbk : bk. 5) eISBN: 978-1-60384-042-2 (e-book)

CONTENTS

Abbreviations Introduction

vii ix

The Faerie Queene, Book Five The Letter to Raleigh The Life of Edmund Spenser Textual Notes Glossary Index of Characters Works Cited and Bibliography

v

1 178 182 185 186 187 188

ABBREVIATIONS Citations from other books of The Faerie Queene are documented in this volume in the conventional format, listing book, canto, stanza, and line number. For example, I.i.37.2 refers to Book One, Canto One, stanza 37, line 2. Citations from Book Five do not list the book number: ix.25 refers to Book Five, Canto Nine, stanza 25. A View

Spenser, Edmund. A View of the State of Ireland.

Gough

Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queene, Book V, ed. Alfred B. Gough.

Hamilton

Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queene, ed. A. C. Hamilton.

Metamorphoses

Ovid. Metamorphoses.

Orlando

Ariosto, Ludovico. Orlando Furioso.

SE

Hamilton, A. C., et al. The Spenser Encyclopedia.

Variorum

Greenlaw, Edwin, et al. The Works of Edmund Spenser: A Variorum Edition: Faerie Queene Book Five.

vii

INTRODUCTION Book Five of The Faerie Queene is structured around Sir Artegall’s quest to liberate Irena, whose kingdom has been usurped by a tyrant. Many side plots spring up along the way, including Artegall’s defeat at the hands of an Amazon and rescue from the shame of cross-dressing by Britomart— herself a female knight and Artegall’s betrothed. And many controversies have sprung up in the course of the poem’s reception—Spenser’s apparent celebration of political violence and the aims of English empire have made Book Five one of the centers of debate in The Faerie Queene. Although these debates and stories are implicated in the rest of the poem, Book Five can be studied coherently on its own. Standing alone, it emerges as one of the most challenging meditations on justice in English literature. The title to Book Five, “The Legend of Artegall, or of Justice,” can be read in two ways. As Artegall pursues his quest, he often seems wise and brave, and a model of justice. In this way he represents what is just, and is truly the knight of justice—so that, in one reading of the title, the word “or” tells us that Artegall is equivalent to Justice. But he also often seems foolish and violent. Readers cannot help but doubt whether many of his actions and decisions are truly just, especially when his sidekick Talus so often erupts, meting out drastic levels of corporal punishment. Each episode of violence pushes us to disagree with Artegall’s version of justice, and so demands a thoughtful evaluation of the entire situation. It becomes not merely Artegall himself who figures forth justice, but the combination of all the figures and all the events of Book Five—it is the entire narrative, so that an alternative reading of “The Legend of Artegall, or of Justice” says that the legend as a whole, rather than Artegall, is equivalent to Justice. At stake in these two readings are a number of discriminations: whether Artegall is a hero or antihero of justice; whether Faerie Land, as an embodiment of Elizabethan justice, fosters hope or despair; and whether our reading of Spenser’s allegory centers on individual personifications or on the dynamics of the story world as a whole. On his journey through the landscape of Faerie, Artegall meets so many examples of injustice, so many giants and tyrants, because, as Canto One explains, the world has fallen from perfection. No longer in the Golden Age, when Justice ruled, the land is now corrupt with injustice. In this it mirrors Spenser’s own age, when, as he says in the Proem, “the world is runne quite out of square” (1.7). Spenser’s involvement in the politics of Elizabeth’s court, particularly in the English colonization ix

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of Ireland, colors the whole of Book Five, making it the part of The Faerie Queene most replete with history. It is a document that captures key political concerns of Elizabethan England, bringing the history alive through allegory. But it also frames politics in ways that have remained pertinent throughout the ages. An earlier editor of Book Five, Alfred Gough, found it descriptive of his own period, World War I. And it seems equally relevant today. Spenser’s personal experiences in Ireland clearly made him sensitive to the difficulty of applying idealized notions of justice to practical situations. Trained in the most idealized terms by Astraea (who leaves the wicked earth in disgust), Artegall must find a way to make justice thrive in the messy circumstances of actual events. This task of moving from justice in the ideal to justice on the ground was an essential political project in Spenser’s time, and it is still so in the twentyfirst century, when ideals of democratic and religious justice are so often reshaped by the pressures of the real world. To read Book Five is to enter into a remarkably experienced vision of the politics of justice. There are six books in The Faerie Queene, each pairing a knight with a virtue—such as Book One, matching the Redcrosse Knight with Holinesse, or Book Three, with Britomart and Chastity. There is also a fragment of a seventh book, called the Mutabilitie Cantos, which represents all that we have of the second half of The Faerie Queene. In the “Letter to Raleigh,” reproduced at the end of this volume, Spenser reveals that he planned twelve books, although six books already places The Faerie Queene among the longest poems in the English language. Even though incomplete, Spenser’s poem has established itself as one of the most influential, one of the most strange and beautiful, in English literature. The Faerie Queene derives much of its fantastic mood, with its knights, giants, fairies, pagans, and enchanters, and much of its style, with its sprawling and interlaced narratives, from the romance tradition, especially from the great Italian poet Ariosto. But while composing it, Spenser seems to have admitted the desire, according to his friend Gabriel Harvey, “to emulate, and hope to overgo” Ariosto’s Orlando Furioso. What Spenser adds to Ariosto is his experiment in sustained allegory. Shaping the poem around the signifying practices of allegory, Spenser creates a more serious and more religious romance than Ariosto’s, but also a more baffling one.

1. Spenserian Allegory Allegory literally means, “speaking otherwise,” implying that the text has a secondary meaning beyond what it literally says. In a plain reading of the plot of Book Five, Irena is merely a damsel in distress, with the particular qualities described in the narrative. But allegorically she can also

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be read as Ireland, and so signifies an extensive field of historical and political meanings. Although for most readers Book Five is very much about England’s domination of Ireland, the word “Ireland” itself never appears: it cannot be assumed that anything in the poem means only what it says. Allegory multiplies and undermines signification. And with interpretation, therefore, less directly tied to the plainest meanings of the text, allegory has allowed readers enormous latitude. One prominent case is the long tradition of reading classical authors as purveyors of Christian truths. John Harrington, in a translation of Ariosto published a year after The Faerie Queene was first printed, reads the pagan myth of Perseus slaying Gorgon as an allegory for a clearly Christian world view. The monster Gorgon allegorizes, according to Harrington, “all bodily substance,” which is overcome by “the angellical nature” on its way to heaven (4v). In these Christian interpretations of classical myth, allegory is brought to the text by the reader. There is no guarantee, in fact no necessity, that the author intended to write allegorically—in such cases allegory is a way of reading. But in other cases allegory is intended by the author, making it a way of writing or a genre. Dante wrote allegory, and so did Spenser: as the “Letter to Raleigh” makes clear, Spenser’s poem is written as “a continued Allegory, or darke conceit.” In its simplest form, Spenser’s allegory makes abstract ideas material: by personifying the idea of envy in a figure called Envie, or by embodying Justice in Artegall. But in its selfconsciousness, Spenserian allegory becomes far more complicated. Spenser is alive to the complexities of allegorical interpretation, and intent on making the reader equally aware. For example, in the episode of the Egalitarian Giant in Canto Two, Spenser queries the very grounds of allegory by parodying its tendency to make abstractions material. The Giant, an expression of an early-modern radicalism akin to communism, has a pair of scales and wants to weigh the entire world in order to redistribute the wealth. Absurdly, this includes trying to weigh air and fire (ii.31), and eventually even words. But what is insubstantial, obviously, cannot be put into an actual scale, and “streight the winged words out of his ballaunce flew” (ii.44.9). The ridiculousness of throwing words onto a scale (which the Giant does), and of their flying out of it (which Spenser’s ironic narrative makes happen), lays bare the absurdity of a language that puts abstract ideas into concrete entities and personifications. Spenser is challenging allegory, and, to make it even further selfconsuming, the challenge is advanced by Artegall, who is himself an embodiment of abstract Justice. The scene becomes an ironic allegory about allegory’s deficiencies, or as Annabel Patterson says, it is about “the way allegory, by setting static emblems in narrative motion, is bound to reveal their inherent failures of logic or truthfulness” (112). That the

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center of the parody, moreover, is a pair of scales, which appears in Canto One as the chief allegorical emblem of the goddess of justice Astraea (i.11.9), projects the episode over the whole of Book Five— highlighting the difficulties of allegorizing Justice. Spenserian allegory has often suffered under the assumption that it works neatly and can be paraphrased coherently, so that the Egalitarian Giant might be categorized as an allegory of the injustice of communism. But such readings, which have been present throughout the centuries, reduce The Faerie Queene to mere platitudes. They led Coleridge to declare, “The dullest and most defective parts of Spenser are those in which we are compelled to think of his agents as allegories” (103). While there is a long roster of famous complaints about Spenserian allegory, modern critics have succeeded in showing it to be not a storehouse of dusty morals, but a startling source of beauty and poetic complexity. Some important modern treatments are: Fletcher 1964, Gross, Lewis 1936 and 1967, Quilligan 1979, Roche, Teskey, Treip, and Tuve. Also see SE: “allegory.”

2. Justice In the “Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser names Aristotle as the primary source for his moral virtues, and The Nicomachean Ethics, particularly its fifth book, introduces a number of ideas that are key to Spenser’s treatment of justice. Aristotle asserts that justice depends upon the golden mean, so that “the unjust is that which violates proportion” (V.iii.14). He identifies two types of justice: distributive, which deals with the honor and wealth due to members of a society; and corrective, which operates to make sure that, in exchanges such as business transactions and theft, each individual gets a fair share. The episodes involving Munera and Pollente in Canto Two and Braggadochio in Canto Three are among the many instances in which Artegall is faced with the task of corrective justice. The Egalitarian Giant of Canto Two and Radigund of Cantos Four and Five can be understood in terms of Aristotle’s distributive justice. In these last two cases, however, a modern reader may have doubts about Aristotelian justice. When the Egalitarian Giant asks, “Were it not good that wrong were then surceast, / And from the most, that some were given to the least?” (ii.37.8–9), our impulses might say yes, the rich should share with the poor, even though Artegall rejects the argument. And when Radigund’s female rule is ended and Britomart “The liberty of women did repeale, / Which they had long usurpt; and them restoring / To men’s subjection, did true Justice deale” (vii.42.5–7), our sense of fairness might disagree with “true Justice.” But both Artegall and Britomart are

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acting justly according to Aristotle’s notion of distributive justice, which, he stresses, does not imply that each member of society deserves equal wealth and honor, but rather that each gets wealth and honor in proportion to his or her position. The lower classes and women quite justly get less, as they did in the hierarchical Elizabethan society. The modern reader must consider in what ways Spenser’s narrative approvingly conveys this (to us) outmoded form of justice, and in what ways it is uneasy with it. Another important concept from Aristotle, and one that allows significant freedom to critique authoritarian codes of justice, is that of equity. Aristotle describes equity as “a rectification of law where law is defective because of its generality” (V.x.6)—it is a move to the spirit rather than the letter of the law, because written laws cannot always be justly applied to specific circumstances. Equity was an important legal concept in the Renaissance and received practical application in the courts of Chancery, where Spenser held office for several years. It is a flexible and challenging concept because it allows us to set aside written law in order to seek justice in particular cases and according to the workings of individual conscience. Although Artegall is taught equity by Astraea (i.7), he seems to pay too little attention, so that Guyon has to remind him of it (iii.36). And it is left to Britomart to explicitly embody equity. In Isis Church we are told that Isis represents equity (vii.3), and in her dream Britomart clearly becomes associated with Isis. Soon after, she does what Artegall had never done: she becomes so dismayed by Talus’ violence that she calls him off from one of his slaughters (vii.36). In the last cantos of Book Five, Artegall also calls Talus off (xi.65 and xii.8), which gives hope that Artegall has learned equity from Britomart (but cf. xii.25). Equity is related to mercy, which has a complex presence in Book Five. In his deployment of Talus, Artegall may or may not learn to be merciful. Elsewhere, not all mercy serves justice: Artegall is captured by Radigund precisely because he so pities her that he throws away his sword (v.13). The difficulty of knowing when to show mercy, and when to carry out justice despite the shadow of cruelty, is a crucial problem in any age. In Spenser’s age it was especially germane to Elizabeth’s judgment of Mary, Queen of Scots. Having delayed taking decisive action for years, Elizabeth finally executed her in 1587. When Spenser allegorizes the trial and execution in Canto Nine, his figure for Elizabeth at this moment of capital punishment is named Mercilla. In addition to Aristotle, Plato’s Republic and Cicero’s De Officiis are likely influences on Spenser’s ideas of justice. Relevant Renaissance texts include Thomas Elyot’s The Boke Named the Governor (1531) and Jean Bodin’s Six Books of the Republic (1576). For further reading on Spenser and justice, see Aptekar, Dunseath, Phillips, and SE: “justice and equity.”

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3. Ireland According to Angus Fletcher, in Book Five “Justice expands in its implications into empire” (1971, 204). Ironically, the Legend of Justice has left many readers convinced of the injustice of Spenser’s politics, because of his deep involvement in England’s bloody colonization of Ireland. Artegall’s quest to save Irena is clearly an extended allegory for the Elizabethan relationship to Ireland: Irena, at times spelled “Eirena,” refers to the Gaelic name for Ireland, Éire; her kingdom is on “the salvage island” (xi.39.3), a single day’s sail from Faerie Land/England (xii.4); and the villain Grantorto is clearly dressed as an Irish soldier (xii.14). Further allusions to the events and people of the conflict are scattered throughout Book Five. The Faerie Queene, moreover, was largely written in Ireland, with Book Five likely composed at Spenser’s plantation in Munster, Kilcolman. This makes the poem a product of the material conditions of colonialism, since the Kilcolman estate came into the hands of New English settlers, and eventually into Spenser’s possession, as a result of the seizure and division of the lands of the rebel Earl of Desmond. The Desmond revolt was quashed in the early 1580s by shockingly violent tactics—a strategy of destruction and starvation that Willy Maley calls “genocidal” (1997, 61). Spenser owned Kilcolman from 1588 until 1598, when, during an uprising in Munster, the estate was sacked. Spenser’s role in the colonization of Ireland was extensive and culpable, as a landowner and, earlier, as secretary to Lord Grey, Elizabeth’s deputy in Ireland from 1580 to 1582. Grey was notorious for brutality, and Spenser almost certainly witnessed his infamous massacre of prisoners at Smerwick, as well as many other instances of Grey’s slash-and-burn policies. Talus recreates these slaughters in Book Five, and Spenser may well want them to feel excessively violent. On the other hand, in his political treatise A View of the Present State of Ireland, Spenser appears to recommend Grey’s strategy of violence and starvation as a way to subdue and reform Ireland. In one famous passage, the character Irenus describes the starvation in Munster in chilling detail: . . . they were brought to such wretchednesse, as that any stony heart would have rued the same. Out of every corner of the woods and glynnes they came creeping forth upon their hands, for their legges could not beare them; they looked like anatomies of death, they spake like ghosts crying out of their graves; they did eate the dead carrions, happy where they could finde them, yea, and one another soone after, insomuch as the very carcasses they spared not to scrape out of their graves; and, if they found a plot of watercresses or shamrocks, there they flocked as to a feast for the time, yet not able long to continue therewithall; that in short space there were none

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almost left, and a most populous and plentifull countrey suddainely left voyde of man and beast; yet sure in all that warre, there perished not many by the sword, but all by the extremitie of famine, which they themselves had wrought (101–2).

Irenus, who largely functions as Spenser’s alter ego, pities the starving people of Munster—but brings them up while advocating that similar measures be used against the people of Ulster. Several other passages make it undeniable that, in A View, Spenser recommends a cruel suppression of the Irish and of Irish culture—reformation “by the sword” (93). It should be kept in mind, however, that there is more subtlety to A View than the often-quoted negative passages suggest. It is written not as expository prose, but as a dialogue, which makes it hard to say precisely that Spenser himself thinks one thing or another. And its detailed use of Irish history, mythology, ethnography, social custom, and language combine to make a nuanced, humanist engagement with the Irish and the problems of the emerging British empire. Spenser may have been an agent of English colonial violence, but he evidently loved Ireland, as is clear when he sets the divine council of the Mutabilitie Cantos on Mount Arlo, the peak visible from his castle at Kilcolman. C. S. Lewis said, “Spenser was the instrument of a detestable policy in Ireland, and in his fifth book the wickedness he had shared begins to corrupt his imagination” (1953, 349). But Lewis also said, “The Faerie Queene should perhaps be regarded as the work of one who is turning into an Irishman” (1966, 126). For further reading, see Brady, Coughlan, Hadfield 1997, Maley 1997, and SE: “Ireland, the cultural context” and “Ireland the historical context.”

4. Artegall Artegall’s name suggests several possible meanings: “(thou) art egalitarian”; “(the) art of equality”; and, when spelled alternately as Arthegall in the 1590 and 1609 editions, “equal to Arthur.” The name has also been considered of Irish origin, and, in ironic contrast, Artegall has been read as echoing Arthur Grey, Spenser’s patron (Variorum, 160–61). Artegall clearly becomes a figure for Lord Grey in Canto Twelve when he returns home dogged by Envie, Detraction, and the Blatant Beast. But it would be reductive to see Grey as a primary allegory throughout. Artegall has a history and a career before Book Five that have little to do with Ireland, nor, at least on the surface, with justice. In Book Three we learn from Merlin’s prophecy that Artegall was a changeling, half brother to Arthur but stolen by fairies, and that he and Britomart will give descent to the line of British kings (III.iii.23–29). In Book Four he appears at a tournament in

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disguise, on his shield the motto “Salvagesse sans finesse”—savagery without refinement or art. Britomart defeats him as the Savage Knight (IV.iv.39–44). Artegall then seeks revenge, but their second fight ends in reconciliation, the revelation of Artegall’s true identity, love, and the promise to marry at some future time (IV.vi.3–44). Artegall next appears in Book Five, now as the titular knight of Justice. In Canto One we learn how he was trained by Astraea and how she left him on earth to carry out justice. But Artegall’s subsequent adventures raise detailed doubts as to whether he is fit for such a task. In Canto One he demonstrates the wisdom of Solomon in revealing Sir Sanglier’s guilt, but imposes an eclectic and far too light punishment on that murderer. In Canto Two he displays wonderful athleticism in his battle with Pollente, and great rhetorical skill in his debate with the Egalitarian Giant. But both episodes end in egregious violence—the mutilation of Munera and the summary execution of the Giant. In Canto Five Artegall blunders his way into captivity and the humiliation of his masculinity at the hands of Radigund, so that he must be rescued by Britomart in Canto Seven. Artegall does free Irena from Grantorto, but his time with Radigund makes him late, nearly subverting his quest. And he is ultimately unable to complete the work of justice in Irena’s kingdom: But ere he could reforme it thoroughly, He through occasion called was away, To Faerie Court, that of necessity His course of Justice he was forst to stay.

(xii.27.1–4)

Although Artegall’s status as an allegorical figure for Justice and his education with Astraea might lead us to assume that he is a representation of perfect justice, he is far from the ideal. Astraea is the ideal, and she has left earth (i.11). Artegall is a figure for humans, striving toward her Justice in the challenging circumstances of the world. As such, he is clearly flawed and, in many ways, easy to dislike. But Artegall also frequently shows flashes of personality—anger at Braggadochio (iii.36), pity for Radigund (v.13), impatience for Burbon’s temporizing (xi.55–56)—that make the allegorical figure somewhat human. In a world “runne quite out of square,” anyone so fully devoted to justice is worthy of a sympathetic reading even when he errs. See Anderson, Aptekar, Dunseath, Stump 2001, and SE: “Artegall.”

5. Talus The greatest obstacle to reading Artegall as a figure for ideal justice is his close association with Talus, the iron man who uses a flail to beat Faerie

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Land into submission. Talus is chilling for his robotic and unstoppable violence—he is “Immoveable, resistlesse, without end” (i.12.7), and has a tendency to leave “heapes” of dead (v.19.6; vii.36.4). However, he is a gift from Astraea, and central to justice in Book Five. He serves as Artegall’s “gard and government” (iv.3.9), providing both protection and the muscle to carry out his judgments, like the police force relative to the courts. To what extent Talus is the justifiable arm of the law, and to what extent he embodies police brutality, is one of the fundamental questions of social justice in the poem. Talus raises another problem of particular importance to empires: his effectiveness allows us to assume that, once justice has decided on the best solution, there are no practical concerns about its ability to exert its will. Such a fantasy of invincibility leads to idealized versions of justice, as if the decision making is all that matters, and the practical implementation of our decisions cannot go awry. Justice requires much more nuance, however, if force cannot assure outcomes, as both modern examples and the Elizabethan experience in Ireland show. Talus is also a figure of abiding fascination in his own right. Fletcher calls him a “perfect allegorical agent,” which has interesting implications for Spenserian allegory (1964, 55). And Spenser gives him a tantalizing bit of interiority and therefore humanity. At the embarrassing moment when he must tell Britomart that Artegall has been imprisoned by Radigund, Talus stands mute and “with conscience / Of his ill newes, did inly chill and quake” (vi.9.5–6). In some fashion the robot has a conscience. In the aftermath of Artegall’s humiliating rescue, at Artegall’s weakest moment, Talus even leads him forward on the quest as “The true guide of his way and vertuous government” (viii.3.9). Perhaps this shows the resourcefulness of Talus, and perhaps it is an emblem for that frightening moment when, in the name of virtue, torturers become leaders. See Fletcher 1971 (137–46), Greenblatt 1983, Wagner, and Variorum (276–80).

6. Britomart Britomart is the Knight of Chastity in Book Three, and then in Book Four becomes engaged to Artegall, establishing her future as the matriarch of the British monarchy. Her destiny accounts for the first half of her name, and the second half, suggestive of Mars and things martial, reflects that she is a woman warrior. It is in this capacity especially that Britomart appears in Book Five, heroically pursuing her own quest in the middle cantos. Britomart’s quest is to clean up Artegall’s mess. Alerted by Talus, she sets off in Canto Six to rescue Artegall, only to find herself nearly trapped by Dolon. Dolon has mistaken Britomart for Artegall and seeks revenge for the death of his son, whom Artegall summarily dispatched in Canto Two (vi.33). Britomart is paying for Artegall’s violence in the early

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cantos, just as she must exert herself to correct his negligence in falling to the Amazon Radigund. Britomart defeats Radigund through military prowess—“She with one stroke both head and helmet cleft” (vii.34.6)— and through exemplary understanding. While Artegall foolishly agrees to be bound to Radigund’s “lore” if he loses (iv.49.3), forsaking Astraea’s “righteous lore” (i.4.9), Britomart refuses all conditions. She not only frees Artegall to resume his original quest, she seems to impart crucial wisdom, humanizing justice in Book Five. It is just after her victory over Radigund that Britomart, demonstrating equity and mercy, becomes the first to limit Talus: Yet when she saw the heapes, which he did make, Of slaughtred carkasses, her heart did quake For very ruth, which did it almost rive, That she his fury willed him to slake. (vii.36.4–7)

Of all the figures in Book Five, Britomart is also the one given the most inward complexity, departing from allegory’s tendency toward flat characters. Artegall’s imprisonment, with its cross-dressing and its descent into romantic melodrama in Canto Five, is laced with overtones of sexual dalliance. Britomart responds with a fit of jealousy worthy of the stage (vi.12–15), as well as a remarkably complex set of motivations in her quest, leading to the psychologically subtle moment when, seeing Artegall in women’s clothes, “with secrete shame, / She turnd her head aside” (vii.38.3–4). In addition, Britomart finds Artegall only after a deeply introspective trial of her own, at the temple of Isis. There she is confronted by the mysteries of pagan iconography, as well as by a dream, which stands at the center of her quest and at the center of Book Five. Britomart’s dream is overdetermined with symbols, but reveals thoughts of power, sex, and violence—it has royal emblems, raging fires, and a crocodile that first threatens to eat Britomart, and then impregnates her (vii.12–16). A priest interprets the dream in terms of the larger allegory of Book Five, identifying her with equity and tying her to Artegall in his project of justice. But the psychological strangeness of Britomart’s dream and the depth of her character exceed all simple allegorical tags. See Bieman, Bowman, Walker, and SE: “Britomart” and “Isis Church.”

7. Elizabeth, Britomart, Radigund One of the most challenging aspects of Britomart’s quest is its conclusion when, after defeating Radigund’s Amazon rule, she reestablishes the politics of female subjugation. Britomart becomes the princess of the city

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Radegone, “And changing all that forme of common weale,” repeals female liberty and restores women “To mens subjection” (vii.42). Although she is a female hero for most of Book Five, Britomart suddenly finishes as a preserver of the masculinist order, turning power over to Artegall and then disappearing from the text as her man leaves on his quest. This contradictory blend of female power and patriarchal ideology is best understood as a feature of Elizabethan England, where a deeply masculine society was ruled for 45 years by a queen. For the queen and her subjects, gender relations required subtle negotiations, such as Spenser attempts in his description of Radigund’s polity: Such is the crueltie of womenkynd, When they have shaken off the shamefast band, With which wise Nature did them strongly bynd, T’obay the heasts of mans well ruling hand, That then all rule and reason they withstand, To purchase a licentious libertie. But vertuous women wisely understand, That they were borne to base humilitie, Unlesse the heavens them lift to lawfull soveraintie.

(v.25)

Deeply chauvinist in the first eight lines, he suddenly changes his tune in the alexandrine, clearly referring to Elizabeth. In this remarkable stanza, Spenser simultaneously preserves patriarchal ideologies and, through the logic of a divine exception, makes room for his queen. The pairing of Britomart and Radigund across Cantos Four through Six may be read as a similar negotiation—the intertwined narratives of the two woman warriors meditate on female power in general and on Elizabeth in particular. Spenser has to be especially careful in such matters, since his entire poem is dedicated to “the most high, mightie, and magnificent empresse” Elizabeth. Furthermore, in the “Letter to Raleigh,” Spenser identifies Gloriana as a figure for his queen—the Faerie Queen is Elizabeth. Spenser made no secret of his pursuit of court favor and did not hesitate to flatter, so much so that Stephen Greenblatt says frankly that Spenser “worships power” (174). But the poet has many resources and can blend critique into praise. In the last stanza of the Proem, he celebrates Elizabeth’s transcendent justice and admits his own status as “basest thrall.” And then he asks pardon for discoursing on “thy great justice praysed over all: / The instrument whereof loe here thy Artegall” (Proem 11). Spenser presents Book Five as “thy” justice and its knight as “thy Artegall”—a move that sounds like an elaborate compliment, until we enter into the poem and discover how frequently disfunctional Artegall and his justice can be.

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For further reading on representations of Elizabeth, see Graziani, Quilligan, Stump 2001, Wells, Woods, and SE: “Elizabeth, images of.”

8. Mercilla The most direct representation of Elizabeth in Book Five is Mercilla, who presides over the trial of Duessa—transparently a figure for Mary, Queen of Scots. In this episode Spenser dares to take on the most controversial and spectacular issue in Elizabeth’s reign. Mary was Catholic with claims on the throne, making her a threat to both Protestant and Elizabeth’s rule. She had plotted against Elizabeth, had perhaps killed her own husband, and was perceived as a beautiful temptress—and yet, for years Elizabeth held her prisoner and refused execution. Finally in 1587, again with much controversy, Mary was tried and executed. Spenser reconfigures these messy events into a highly orderly scene, with the Court of Mercilla populated by allegorical personifications such as Awe, Order, and Zele. He accentuates Elizabeth’s justice by making her a commanding presence in the courtroom—when in fact Elizabeth was absent—and by politely hiding the execution itself from the narrative. This neat scene is qualified, however, by the very disturbing two stanzas that precede it: as Arthur and Artegall enter Mercilla’s court, they see a poet with his tongue nailed to a post, punished for criticizing the Queen (ix.25–26). Is Spenser emphasizing that he, unlike the bad poet Malfont, is being a good poet? Is he protesting against state censorship? Is he hinting that his portrayal of Mary’s trial is subversive? The stanzas were prescient: Mary’s son James (later King James I) took offense at Canto Nine and tried, unsuccessfully, to have Spenser punished. Malfont is particularly hard to interpret, but he serves to raise our awareness of the difficulty of writing poetry about recent political events. Spenser inserts him just as he is turning to Mary, Queen of Scots, and to the several historical allegories that dominate the end of Book Five. On Mercilla and Mary, see Gallagher, Goldberg, McCabe, Variorum, 319–24; and SE: “Mary, Queen of Scots” and “Mercilla.”

9. Historical Allegory While much of Book Five pertains to Ireland, Mercilla marks a turn in the final cantos to explicit and extended historical allegory. In Canto Eight Arthur defeats Mercilla’s enemy, the Souldan. The Souldan is commonly read as a figure for Philip II, King of Spain, and his fearsome chariot recalls the Spanish Armada. After representing Mary, Queen of Scots in Canto Nine, Spenser takes on the English intervention in the Netherlands, through Arthur’s aid to Belge in Cantos Ten and Eleven. Then Artegall’s rescue of Burbon clearly alludes to Henry Bourbon of Navarre, the

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French King who broke Protestant faith. And Book Five concludes with Artegall freeing Irena, finishing the allegorical treatment of Ireland. These cantos are full of specific historical allusions, which have led Spenserians to many different decipherings—for examples beyond this volume’s notes, see Variorum, 299–335. At times Spenser is rewriting history, not merely reporting it. Arthur saves Belge in the poem, but the English adventure to the Netherlands in fact failed militarily; rather than the heroic celebration Arthur receives, the earl of Leicester was politically humiliated. Spenser is also organizing events, providing, as only literature can, an imaginative lens with which to view recent history. Grantorto, the villain behind both Burbon’s and Irena’s difficulties, represents the political force of Philip II and Catholic Spain. Spain is also behind the enemy in the Netherlands and, more indirectly, Mary’s resistance to Elizabeth. The final cantos, then, are unified by their representation of the epochal struggle between English Protestantism and Catholicism. As Kenneth Borris argues, this confrontation was often cast in apocalyptic terms, with the Pope as the Antichrist in the English imagination. Justice becomes deeply intertwined in Protestant apocalyptic thinking, so that current politics become a phantasmagoria of giants and monsters and chivalric heroes. Book Five’s final cantos serve as an example of how malleable history can be when worked upon by the persuasive imagination of a poet. See Borris, Gregory, Mallette, Prescott, and SE: “allegory, historical.”

10. Book Five’s Characters in Other Books After Artegall and Britomart, who have already been discussed, the main character with an earlier history is Arthur. Spenser picks up his story when Arthur is a knight, before becoming king. Rather than matching him with Guinevere, Spenser adopts the alternate tradition that Arthur became romantically involved with fairies. Spenser’s Arthur had a dream in which he saw and fell in love with the Faerie Queen, Gloriana, and vowed upon waking to seek her out (I.ix.13–15). This quest leads him across the Faerie landscape and into the narrative of each of Spenser’s six books. Arthur generally shows up in the later cantos as a kind of deus ex machina, setting things right and enabling the titular knight to continue the quest. If The Faerie Queene had been finished, presumably Arthur would have taken part in all twelve books, knitting together all twelve virtues to become the true hero of the entire poem. We can guess that, in Book Twelve, Arthur would finally meet Gloriana, fulfilling his role as an emblem for “magnificence” (“Letter to Raleigh”). Another figure with a long prehistory is Duessa. Although a clear figure for Mary, Queen of Scots in Book Five, in Book One she plays a more theological role as the witch seductress of the Knight of Holinesse.

xxii

Introduction

Set off against the maiden Una, the pure figure of oneness and truth, Duessa embodies doubleness and falsehood. She appears beautiful, but proves to be “A loathly, wrinckled hag” (I.viii.46.8). Duessa makes several more appearances throughout The Faerie Queene. Canto Three, telling of the wedding of Florimell, has a number of characters from earlier books. At the center are Marinell and Florimell, whose love is left unfulfilled in Book Four. We also meet Guyon, the Knight of Temperance in Book Two, and Braggadochio, a parodic knight who bedevils Guyon and others throughout the earlier books. Florimell is especially noteworthy for her endless persecution and victimhood, and the comic resolution of her narrative, as well as Braggadochio’s unmasking, suggests the possibility of happy and just endings in general—as befits the legend of Justice. But Canto Three stands in contrast to the narrative of Artegall and Britomart, whose love affair is left unresolved when Artegall leaves his betrothed to continue his quest. Resistance to closure is especially felt in Canto Twelve, where Artegall is last seen hounded by the Blatant Beast, a doglike creature who spreads infamy and discourtesy. In the tradition of romance, this narrative thread continues beyond Book Five, as the Blatant Beast continues to run barking throughout Book Six.

11. Language, Sources, Annotations Like Shakespeare, Spenser is free and inventive with language. He is also intentionally archaic, arousing the sense of a past chivalry and a lost golden age. Although The Faerie Queene may therefore feel doubly archaic to the modern reader, this edition preserves most of Spenser’s idiosyncrasies. Punctuation is not standardized, and spelling is especially variable—so a word may be spelled two ways in a single line, as in: “He could his weapon shift from side to syde” (xi.6.5). The stanza of The Faerie Queene, a variation on the Italian ottava rima, is unique to Spenser and has since become eponymous—the Spenserian stanza. It has eight lines of iambic pentameter, punctuated in unusual style by a twelve-syllable alexandrine. And it has a complicated, interwoven rhyme scheme: ababbcbcc. Spenser’s debts to romance and epic traditions are clear, as he points out in “The Letter to Raleigh.” He also draws on a wide set of sources for his mythology, although he often submits the myths to his own invention, making it difficult to trace these exactly. He frequently seems to be working from the Italian mythographers, especially Natale Conti’s Mythologiae (1567), but because Conti is not readily available in a complete translation, this volume’s annotations refer to Ovid’s Metamorphoses and other common texts for further research. (For Conti’s influence on Spenser, see Lotspeich.) The reader will also find assistance in the Glossary and Index of Characters at the back.

Title page to the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23082)

TO THE MOST HIGH, MIGHTIE And MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE RENOVVMED FOR PIETIE, VERTVE, AND ALL GRATIOVS GOVERNMENT ELIZABETH BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND FRAVNCE AND IRELAND AND OF VIRGINIA, DEFENDOVR OF THE FAITH, &c. HER MOST HVMBLE SERVAVNT EDMVND SPENSER DOTH IN ALL HVMILITIE DEDICATE, PRESENT AND CONSECRATE THESE HIS LABOVRS TO LIVE VVITH THE ETERNITIE OF HER FAME.

THE FIFTH

BOOKE OF THE FAERIE QVEENE.

Contayning, THE LEGEND OF ARTEGALL OR

OF IVSTICE. 1

So oft as I with state of present time, The image of the antique world compare, When as mans age was in his freshest prime, And the first blossome of faire vertue bare, Such oddes1 I finde twixt those, and these which are, As that, through long continuance of his course, Me seemes the world is runne quite out of square, From the first point of his appointed sourse, And being once amisse growes daily wourse and wourse.

2

For from the golden age, that first was named, It’s now at earst2 become a stonie one; And men themselves, the which at first were framed Of earthly mould, and form’d of flesh and bone, Are now transformed into hardest stone: Such as behind their backs (so backward bred) Were throwne by Pyrrha and Deucalione:3 And if then those may any worse be red,4 They into that ere long will be degendered.

3

Let none then blame me, if in discipline5 Of vertue and of civill uses lore,6 I doe not forme them to the common line Of present dayes, which are corrupted sore,

1

being the bones of Mother Earth, over their shoulders. From the stones sprang people (Metamorphoses, 1.347–415). 4 red: supposed. 5 discipline: instruction, practice. See “Letter to Raleigh.” 6 civill uses lore: wisdom in political use or practice.

oddes: difference. at earst: in time. For the Golden Age and succeeding ages, see Metamorphoses, 1.89–150. Spenser invents the age of stone, even worse than iron. 3 After Zeus punished humankind with a flood, only Deucalion and his wife Pyrrha survived. Themis bade them throw stones, 2

3

4

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

But to the antique use, which was of yore, When good was onely for it selfe desyred, And all men sought their owne, and none no more; When Justice was not for most meed outhyred,1 But simple Truth did rayne, and was of all admyred. 4

For that which all men then did vertue call, Is now cald vice; and that which vice was hight,2 Is now hight vertue, and so us’d of all: Right now is wrong, and wrong that was is right, As all things else in time are chaunged quight. Ne wonder; for the heavens revolution Is wandred farre from, where it first was pight,3 And so doe make contrarie constitution4 Of all this lower world, toward his dissolution.

5

For who so list into the heavens looke, And search the courses of the rowling spheares,5 Shall find that from the point, where they first tooke Their setting forth, in these few thousand yeares They all are wandred much; that plaine appeares. For that same golden fleecy Ram, which bore Phrixus and Helle from their stepdames feares, Hath now forgot, where he was plast of yore, And shouldred hath the Bull, which fayre Europa bore.6

1

meed outhyred: hired out with a payment or bribe. 2 hight: called. 3 pight: placed. 4 constitution: organizing or framing structure. Spenser adopts the astrological notion that the moral order of the world depends upon the movement of the stars, as designed in God’s creation. So chaotic or “contrarie” movements in the heavens cause chaos in the lower world. The following stanzas describe such a departure from the original order of things. On Spenser’s use of the stars in the Proem, see Fowler, 192–96.

5 In Ptolemaic astronomy, the planets and stars were thought to move within concentric spheres. 6 Within the inexactitude of the Ptolemaic system, the signs of the zodiac, by the sixteenth century, had shifted away from their original constellations. So, the constellation Aries (ram) had moved into the place of Taurus (bull). Spenser links the ram to the myth of Phrixus and Helle, as told by Boccaccio (De Genealogia Deorum, 13.68). He links the bull to the myth of Europa (Metamorphoses, 2.833–875). Spenser makes the same associations in The Mutabilitie Cantos (VII.vii.32–33).

Proem

6

And eke the Bull hath with his bow-bent horne So hardly butted those two twinnes of Jove, That they have crusht the Crab, and quite him borne Into the great Nemaean lions grove.1 So now all range, and doe at randon rove Out of their proper places farre away, And all this world with them amisse doe move, And all his creatures from their course astray, Till they arrive at their last ruinous decay.

7

Ne is that same great glorious lampe of light,2 That doth enlumine all these lesser fyres, In better case, ne keepes his course more right, But is miscaried with the other Spheres. For since the terme of fourteene hundred yeres, That learned Ptolomae his hight did take, He is declyned from that marke of theirs, Nigh thirtie minutes to the Southerne lake;3 That makes me feare in time he will us quite forsake.

8

And if to those Aegyptian wisards old, Which in Star-read4 were wont have best insight, Faith may be given, it is by them told, That since the time they first tooke the Sunnes hight, Foure times his place he shifted hath in sight, And twice hath risen, where he now doth West, And wested twice, where he ought rise aright.5 But most is Mars amisse of all the rest, And next to him old Saturne, that was wont be best.6

1

Aries crowds Gemini (twins), who crush Cancer (crab), which is carried into Leo (lion). Spenser links Gemini to the twins Castor and Pollux, sometimes considered sons of Jove. He links Leo to the Nemean Lion, which Hercules killed in his first labor. 2 The sun, thought to illuminate the stars and planets (the lesser fires). This stanza describes how measurements revealed that the sun had shifted southward slightly since Ptolemy, although thirty minutes is incorrect. See Variorum, 158.

3

5

Southerne lake: the oceans of the southern hemisphere. 4 Star-read: star lore, astronomy. 5 Egyptian astronomers had observed these anomalies, according to Herodotus (2.142). See Variorum, 159. 6 Before Kepler in 1609, astronomers assumed circular rather than elliptical orbits. But they worried about the planets’ observed departures from the circle, and Mars and Saturn were examples of obvious eccentricity.

6

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

9

For during Saturnes ancient raigne it’s sayd, That all the world with goodnesse did abound: All loved vertue, no man was affrayd Of force, ne fraud in wight1 was to be found: No warre was knowne, no dreadfull trompets sound, Peace universall rayn’d mongst men and beasts, And all things freely grew out of the ground: Justice sate high ador’d with solemne feasts, And to all people did divide her dred beheasts.2

10

Most sacred vertue she of all the rest, Resembling God in his imperiall might; Whose soveraine powre is herein most exprest, That both to good and bad he dealeth right, And all his workes with Justice hath bedight.3 That powre he also doth to Princes lend, And makes them like himselfe in glorious sight, To sit in his owne seate, his cause to end,4 And rule his people right, as he doth recommend.

11

Dread Soverayne Goddesse,5 that doest highest sit In seate of judgement, in th’Almighties place,6 And with magnificke might and wondrous wit Doest to thy people righteous doome7 aread, That furthest Nations filles with awfull dread, Pardon the boldnesse of thy basest thrall, That dare discourse of so divine a read,8 As thy great justice praysed over all: The instrument whereof loe here thy Artegall.

1

wight: person. divide: dispense; beheasts: commands. 3 bedight: equipped. 4 end: fulfill. 5 Spenser speaks directly to Queen Elizabeth. 2

6

The 1609 edition changes “place” to “stead” in order to preserve the rhyme. 7 doome: judgment. 8

read: subject.

Canto One Artegall trayn’d in Justice lore1 Irenaes quest pursewed, He doeth avenge on Sanglier his Ladies bloud embrewed.

1

Though vertue then were held in highest price, In those old times, of which I doe intreat,2 Yet then likewise the wicked seede of vice Began to spring which shortly grew full great, And with their boughes the gentle plants did beat. But evermore some of the vertuous race Rose up, inspired with heroicke heat, That cropt the branches of the sient base,3 And with strong hand their fruitfull rancknes4 did deface.

2

Such first was Bacchus,5 that with furious might All th’East before untam’d did overronne, And wrong repressed, and establisht right, Which lawlesse men had formerly fordonne.6 There Justice first her princely rule begonne. Next Hercules his like ensample shewed, Who all the West with equall conquest wonne, And monstrous tyrants with his club subdewed; The club of Justice dread, with kingly powre endewed.

3

And such was he, of whom I have to tell, The Champion of true Justice Artegall. Whom (as ye lately mote remember well)7

1

tion of the vine. He is often paired with Hercules, who subdued monsters and established cities in the west; e.g., Horace, Odes, 3.3. 6 fordonne: done in. 7 In IV.vi.42, Artegall left his fiancée, Britomart, just after wooing her, to pursue his quest. For Artegall’s name, see Introduction, 4.

lore: wisdom. intreat: treat. 3 sient base: base shoots. 4 rancknes: ranks––used for rows of trees and soldiers, and to indicate social level and luxuriant or corrupt growth. 5 Bacchus conquered the east, spreading justice and civilization as well as the cultiva2

7

8

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

An hard adventure, which did then befall, Into redoubted perill forth did call; That was to succour a distressed Dame, Whom a strong tyrant did unjustly thrall,1 And from the heritage, which she did clame, Did with strong hand withhold: Grantorto 2 was his name. 4

Wherefore the Lady, which Eirena hight,3 Did to the Faery Queene her way addresse, To whom complayning her afflicted plight, She her besought of gratious redresse.4 That soveraine Queene, that mightie Emperesse, Whose glorie is to aide all suppliants pore, And of weake Princes to be Patronesse, Chose Artegall to right her to restore; For that to her he seem’d best skild in righteous lore.5

5

For Artegall in justice was upbrought Even from the cradle of his infancie, And all the depth of rightfull doome6 was taught By faire Astraea,7 with great industrie, Whilest here on earth she lived mortallie. For till the world from his perfection fell Into all filth and foule iniquitie, Astraea here mongst earthly men did dwell, And in the rules of justice them instructed well.

6

Whiles through the world she walked in this sort, Upon a day she found this gentle childe, Amongst his peres playing his childish sport: Whom seeing fit, and with no crime defilde, She did allure with gifts and speaches milde,

1

thrall: subjugate, enslave. In Italian, “great wrong.” A general figure for tyranny, he is associated variously with the King of Spain, the Irish rebel, the Earl of Desmond, and papal power. 3 Eirena hight: is called Eirena. Refers to Éire, Gaelic for “Ireland,” and Ierne, the traditional name in Greek. Also suggests the Greek word for “peace.” 2

4

She begged the Queen for gracious help. lore: wisdom. 6 doome: judgment. 7 Daughter of Zeus and Themis, the goddess of justice. See Metamorphoses, 1.149–50. Upon leaving earth, Astraea was transformed into the constellation Virgo. In naming the zodiac, the Proem leaves off at Leo; Virgo, or Astraea, is the next sign. Also see Yates. 5

Canto One

9

To wend1 with her. So thence him farre she brought Into a cave from companie exilde, In which she noursled him, till yeares he raught,2 And all the discipline of justice there him taught. 7

There she him taught to weigh both right and wrong In equall ballance with due recompence, And equitie to measure out along, According to the line of conscience, When so it needs with rigour to dispence.3 Of all the which, for want there of mankind, She caused him to make experience Upon wyld beasts, which she in woods did find, With wrongfull powre oppressing others of their kind.

8

Thus she him trayned, and thus she him taught, In all the skill of deeming wrong and right, Untill the ripenesse of mans yeares he raught; That even wilde beasts did feare his awfull sight, And men admyr’d his overruling might; Ne any liv’d on ground, that durst withstand His dreadfull heast,4 much lesse him match in fight, Or bide the horror of his wreakfull5 hand, When so he list in wrath lift up his steely brand.6

9

Which steely brand, to make him dreaded more, She gave unto him, gotten by her slight7 And earnest search, where it was kept in store In Joves eternall house, unwist of wight,8 Since he himselfe it us’d in that great fight Against the Titans, that whylome9 rebelled

1

wend: go. noursled: nurtured; raught: reached (mature) years. 3 Two contrary readings are possible: equity either administers rigor or does without it. For equity and justice, see Introduction, 2. 4 heast: command. 5 wreakfull: vengeful. 2

6

brand: sword. slight: trickery. Hamilton notes the possible irony of the knight of justice wielding a stolen sword. 8 unwist of wight: unknown by any creature. 9 whylome: in the past. For the Titans, see Hesiod, Theogony, 617–735; and Metamorphoses, 1.151–53. 7

10

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Gainst highest heaven; Chrysaor1 it was hight; Chrysaor that all other swords excelled, Well prov’d in that same day, when Jove those Gyants quelled. 10

For of most perfect metall it was made, Tempred with Adamant2 amongst the same, And garnisht all with gold upon the blade In goodly wise, whereof it tooke his name, And was of no lesse vertue, then of fame. For there no substance was so firme and hard, But it would pierce or cleave, where so it came; Ne any armour could his dint out ward,3 But wheresoever it did light, it throughly shard.4

11

Now when the world with sinne gan to abound, Astraea loathing lenger here to space5 Mongst wicked men, in whom no truth she found, Return’d to heaven, whence she deriv’d her race; Where she hath now an everlasting place, Mongst those twelve signes, which nightly we doe see The heavens bright-shining baudricke to enchace;6 And is the Virgin, sixt in her degree, And next her selfe her righteous ballance hanging bee.7

12

But when she parted hence, she left her groome An yron man, which did on her attend Alwayes, to execute her stedfast doome,8 And willed him with Artegall to wend,9 And doe what ever thing he did intend. His name was Talus,10 made of yron mould,

1

In Greek, “golden sword.” See Hesiod, Theogony, 281. 2 Mythical substance, sometimes associated with diamond or steel, of unsurpassed strength. 3 out ward: fend off. 4 shard: cut. 5 space: roam. 6 baudricke: a richly jeweled belt, here a metaphor for the zodiac; enchace: adorn.

7

Virgo, the sixth sign in the zodiac, is next to the constellation Libra, the scales. 8 doome: judgment. 9 wend: go. 10 Modeled after Talos, a mythological man of bronze who traveled around Crete carrying tablets inscribed with the laws. For the many sources, see Variorum, 165–66. Talus may also suggest “talon,” for its sharp violence, or, as Hamilton suggests, the Latin talio, as in retaliation. See Introduction, 5.

Canto One

Immoveable, resistlesse, without end. Who in his hand an yron flale did hould, With which he thresht out falshood, and did truth unfould. 13

He now went with him in this new inquest,1 Him for to aide, if aide he chaunst to neede, Against that cruell Tyrant, which opprest The faire Irena with his foule misdeede, And kept the crowne in which she should succeed. And now together on their way they bin,2 When as they saw a Squire in squallid weed,3 Lamenting sore his sorowfull sad tyne,4 With many bitter teares shed from his blubbred eyne.

14

To whom as they approched, they espide A sorie sight, as ever seene with eye; An headlesse Ladie lying him beside, In her owne blood all wallow’d wofully, That her gay clothes did in discolour die. Much was he moved at that ruefull sight; And flam’d with zeale of vengeance inwardly, He askt, who had that Dame so fouly dight;5 Or whether his owne hand, or whether other wight?

15

“Ah woe is me, and well away” (quoth hee) Bursting forth teares, like springs out of a banke, “That ever I this dismall day did see: Full farre was I from thinking such a pranke; Yet litle losse it were, and mickle6 thanke, If I should graunt that I have doen the same, That I mote drinke the cup, whereof she dranke: But that I should die guiltie of the blame, The which another did, who now is fled with shame.”

16

“Who was it then” (sayd Artegall) “that wrought? And why? doe it declare unto me trew.” “A knight” (said he) “if knight he may be thought,

1

4

2

5

inquest: quest, judicial inquiry. bin: were. 3 weed: clothing.

tyne: trouble. dight: treated. 6 mickle: much.

11

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

12

That did his hand in Ladies bloud embrew,1 And for no cause, but as I shall you shew. This day as I in solace2 sate hereby With a fayre love, whose losse I now do rew, There came this knight, having in companie This lucklesse Ladie, which now here doth headlesse lie. 17

“He, whether mine seem’d fayrer in his eye, Or that he wexed3 weary of his owne, Would change with me; but I did it denye; So did the Ladies both, as may be knowne, But he, whose spirit was with pride upblowne, Would not so rest contented with his right, But having from his courser her downe throwne, Fro me reft mine away by lawlesse might, And on his steed her set, to beare her out of sight.

18

“Which when his Ladie saw, she follow’d fast, And on him catching hold, gan loud to crie Not so to leave her, nor away to cast, But rather of his hand besought to die. With that his sword he drew all wrathfully, And at one stroke cropt off her head with scorne, In that same place, whereas it now doth lie. So he my love away with him hath borne, And left me here, both his and mine owne love to morne.”

19

“Aread”4 (sayd he) “which way then did he make? And by what markes may he be knowne againe?” “To hope” (quoth he) “him soone to overtake, That hence so long departed, is but vaine: But yet he pricked5 over yonder plaine, And as I marked, bore upon his shield, By which it’s easie him to know againe, A broken sword within a bloodie field; Expressing well his nature, which the same did wield.”

1

embrew: soak. solace: pleasure, comfort. 3 wexed: grew. 2

4

Aread: declare. pricked: spurred a horse. Recalls the opening of The Faerie Queene, “A Gentle Knight was pricking on the plaine” (I.i.1). 5

Canto One

20

No sooner sayd, but streight he after sent His yron page, who him pursew’d so light, As that is seem’d above the ground he went: For he was swift as swallow in her flight,1 And strong as Lyon in his Lordly might. It was not long, before he overtooke Sir Sanglier; 2 (so cleeped was that Knight) Whom at the first he ghessed by his looke, And by the other markes, which of his shield he tooke.

21

He bad him stay, and backe with him retire; Who full of scorne to be commaunded so, The Lady to alight did eft3 require, Whilest he reformed that uncivill fo: And streight at him with all his force did go. Who mov’d no more therewith, then when a rocke Is lightly stricken with some stones throw; But to him leaping, lent him such a knocke, That on the ground he layd him like a sencelesse blocke.4

22

But ere he could him selfe recure againe, Him in his iron paw he seized had; That when he wak’t out of his warelesse5 paine, He found him selfe unwist, so ill bestad,6 That lim he could not wag. Thence he him lad, Bound like a beast appointed to the stall: The sight whereof the Lady sore adrad, And fain’d7 to fly for feare of being thrall; But he her quickly stayd, and forst to wend withall.

23

When to the place they came, where Artegall By that same carefull8 Squire did then abide, He gently gan him to demaund of all,

1

Talus has superhuman speed, and so overtakes Sir Sanglier despite the latter’s head start. 2 In French, “wild boar.” Artegall has in fact already beaten him in a tournament (IV.iv.40). 3 eft: then.

4

13

I.e., Sir Sanglier is knocked out. warelesse: unconscious or without wariness. 6 unwist: unknowing how; bestad: situated. 7 fain’d: attempted. 8 carefull: full of cares and worries. 5

14

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

That did betwixt him and that Squire betide.1 Who with sterne countenance and indignant pride Did aunswere, that of all he guiltlesse stood, And his accuser thereuppon defide:2 For neither he did shed that Ladies bloud, Nor tooke away his love, but his owne proper good.3 24

Well did the Squire perceive him selfe too weake, To aunswere his defiaunce in the field, And rather chose his challenge off to breake, Then to approve4 his right with speare and shield. And rather guilty chose him selfe to yield. But Artegall by signes perceiving plaine, That he it was not, which that Lady kild, But that strange Knight, the fairer love to gaine, Did cast about by sleight5 the truth thereout to straine.

25

And sayd, “Now sure this doubtfull causes right Can hardly but by Sacrament6 be tride, Or else by ordele,7 or by blooddy fight; That ill perhaps mote fall to either side. But if ye please, that I your cause decide, Perhaps I may all further quarrell end, So ye will sweare my judgement to abide.” Thereto they both did franckly condiscend,8 And to his doome with listfull9 eares did both attend.

26

“Sith then” (sayd he) “ye both the dead deny, And both the living Lady claime your right, Let both the dead and living equally Devided be betwixt you here in sight, And each of either take his share aright.10

1

5

2

6

betide: happen. Sanglier defies the Squire to prove his story by means of combat. The knight with justice on his side, according to the notion of judicial combat, gains victory through God’s intervention. 3 proper good: possession. 4 approve: prove.

sleight: trick. Sacrament: solemn oath. 7 A physical ordeal, by fire or water, meant to determine guilt. 8 condiscend: consent. 9 listfull: carefully listening. 10 Recalling the judgment of Solomon (1 Kings 3.16–28).

Canto One

15

But looke who does dissent from this my read,1 He for a twelve moneths day shall in despight Beare for his penaunce that same Ladies head; To witnesse to the world, that she by him is dead.”2 27

Well pleased with that doome was Sangliere, And offred streight the Lady to be slaine. But that same Squire, to whom she was more dere, When as he saw she should be cut in twaine, Did yield, she rather should with him3 remaine Alive, then to him selfe be shared dead; And rather then his love should suffer paine, He chose with shame to beare that Ladies head. True love despiseth4 shame, when life is cald in dread.

28

Whom when so willing Artegall perceaved; “Not so thou Squire,” (he sayd) “but thine I deeme The living Lady, which from thee he reaved:5 For worthy thou of her doest rightly seeme. And you, Sir Knight, that love so light esteeme, As that ye would for little leave the same, Take here your owne, that doth you best beseeme, And with it beare the burden of defame; Your owne dead Ladies head, to tell abrode your shame.”

29

But Sangliere disdained much his doome, And sternly gan repine at his beheast;6 Ne would for ought obay, as did become,7 To beare that Ladies head before his breast. Untill that Talus had his pride represt, And forced him, maulgre,8 it up to reare. Who when he saw it bootelesse to resist, He tooke it up, and thence with him did beare, As rated Spaniell takes his burden up for feare.9

1

read: judgment. Cf. Malory, Le Morte D’Arthur, 6.17. 3 I.e., Sanglier. 4 despiseth: disregards. 5 reaved: robbed. 2

6

beheast: promise. as did become: as was appropriate. 8 maulgre: reluctantly. 9 Spenser makes frequent use of dog similes: ii.25; vi.26; viii.7, 22, 36, 49; ix.6; xi.12; xii.38. 7

16 30

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Much did that Squire Sir Artegall adore, For his great justice, held in high regard; And as his Squire him offred evermore To serve, for want of other meete reward, And wend with him on his adventure hard. But he thereto would by no meanes consent; But leaving him forth on his journey far’d: Ne wight with him but onely Talus went. They two enough t’encounter an whole Regiment.

Canto Two Artegall heares of Florimell, Does with the Pagan fight: Him slaies, drownes Lady Munera, Does race her castle quight.

1

Nought is more honorable to a knight, Ne better doth beseeme1 brave chevalry, Then to defend the feeble in their right, And wrong redresse in such as wend awry. Whilome2 those great Heroes got thereby Their greatest glory, for their rightfull deedes, And place deserved with the Gods on hy. Herein the noblesse of this knight exceedes, Who now to perils great for justice sake proceedes.

2

To which as he now was uppon the way, He chaunst to meet a Dwarfe in hasty course; Whom he requir’d3 his forward hast to stay, Till he of tidings mote with him discourse. Loth was the Dwarfe, yet did he stay perforse, And gan of sundry4 newes his store to tell, As to his memory they had recourse: But chiefely of the fairest Florimell, How she was found againe, and spousde to Marinell.5

1

(III.v.3–11). She is chased and harassed throughout Books Three and Four, and finally imprisoned by Proteus under the sea (III.viii.29–43). Meanwhile a witch creates the “False Florimell” out of snow (III.viii.5–10). The False Florimell is passed from knight to knight, ending up with Braggadocchio (IV.v.14–27). The real Florimell is sought by Satyrane and other knights of the Faerie Court, and, at the end of Book Four, is saved from Proteus and betrothed to Marinell (IV.xii.28–35).

beseeme: suit. Whilome: in the past. 3 requir’d: requested. 4 sundry: various. 5 The story of Florimell unfolds in Books Three and Four. The beautiful and virginal Florimell was raised by the Graces, whence she received her girdle, endowed with chastity and much sought (IV.v.1–6). She loves Marinell, a sea nymph’s son, but hears in the Faerie Court that he is dead 2

17

18

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

3

For this was Dony, Florimels owne Dwarfe, Whom having lost (as ye have heard whyleare) And finding in the way the scattred scarfe,1 The fortune of her life long time did feare. But of her health when Artegall did heare, And safe returne, he was full inly glad, And askt him where, and when her bridale cheare Should be solemniz’d: for if time he had, He would be there, and honor to her spousall ad.

4

“Within three daies” (quoth hee) “as I do here, It will be at the Castle of the strond;2 What time if naught me let,3 I will be there To doe her service, so as I am bond. But in my way a little here beyond A cursed cruell Sarazin doth wonne,4 That keepes a Bridges passage by strong hond, And many errant Knights hath there fordonne; That makes all men for feare that passage for to shonne.”5

5

“What mister wight”6 (quoth he) “and how far hence Is he, that doth to travellers such harmes?” “He is” (said he) “a man of great defence; Expert in battell and in deedes of armes; And more emboldned by the wicked charmes, With which his daughter doth him still support; Having great Lordships7 got and goodly farmes, Through strong oppression of his powre extort;8 By which he stil them holds, and keepes with strong effort.

6

“And dayly he his wrongs encreaseth more, For never wight he lets to passe that way; Over his Bridge, albee he9 rich or poore,

1

In a conversation with Arthur, Dony tells of losing Florimell (III.v.3–12). The scarf is Florimell’s girdle, dropped while she is fleeing a hyena (III.vii.31). “Dony” recalls the Italian word for “squire.” 2 Marinell lives on a seacoast called the Rich Strond (III.iv.20). 3 let: prevent. 4 Sarazin: pagan; wonne: dwell.

5

For similar episodes, see Malory, Morte D’Arthur, 6.10; and Orlando, 29.33. 6 What mister wight: what kind of person, what rank or occupation. 7 Lordships: estates. 8 extort: extorted. This archaic participle also may recall the tyrant Grantorto. 9 albee he: although he is.

Canto Two

19

But he him makes his passage-penny pay: Else he doth hold him backe or beat away. Thereto he hath a groome of evill guize, Whose scalp is bare, that bondage doth bewray,1 Which pols and pils2 the poore in piteous wize; But he him selfe uppon the rich doth tyrannize. 7

“His name is hight Pollente,3 rightly so For that he is so puissant and strong, That with his powre he all doth overgo, And makes them subject to his mighty wrong; And some by sleight he eke doth underfong.4 For on a Bridge he custometh to fight, Which is but narrow, but exceeding long; And in the same are many trap fals pight,5 Through which the rider downe doth fall through oversight.

8

“And underneath the same a river flowes, That is both swift and dangerous deepe withall; Into the which whom so he overthrowes, All destitute of helpe doth headlong fall, But he him selfe, through practise usuall, Leapes forth into the floud, and there assaies6 His foe confused through his sodaine fall, That horse and man he equally dismaies, And either both them drownes, or trayterously slaies.

9

“Then doth he take the spoile of them at will, And to his daughter brings, that dwels thereby: Who all that comes doth take, and therewith fill The coffers of her wicked threasury;

1

bewray: reveal. pols and pils: plunders and pillages. There are several puns here: “poll” also means a bare head, and “to pill” is also to shave or to remove the skin of the scalp––hence the groom’s bare scalp “doth bewray” his actions. “To poll” is also to tax, as they are doing to travelers crossing the bridge. Spenser alludes to the common 2

abuse of tolls and monopolies in general. See Variorum, 170–71. 3 From the Latin word for “power,” and the Italian word for “powerful.” The name continues the pun on “poll,” which reaches a climax in 19.4. 4 underfong: entrap. 5 trap fals pight: falsely placed traps––i.e., trapdoors. 6 assaies: attacks.

20

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Which she with wrongs hath heaped up so hy, That many Princes she in wealth exceedes, And purchast all the countrey lying ny With the revenue of her plenteous meedes,1 Her name is Munera,2 agreeing with her deedes. 10

“Thereto she is full faire, and rich attired, With golden hands and silver feete beside, That many Lords have her to wife desired: But she them all despiseth for great pride.” “Now by my life” (sayd he) “and God to guide, None other way will I this day betake, But by that Bridge, whereas he doth abide: Therefore me thither lead.” No more he spake, But thitherward forthright his ready way did make.

11

Unto the place he came within a while, Where on the Bridge he ready armed saw The Sarazin, awayting for some spoile. Who as they to the passage gan to draw, A villaine to them came with scull all raw, That passage money did of them require, According to the custome of their law. To whom he aunswerd wroth, “Loe there thy hire;”3 And with that word him strooke, that streight he did expire.

12

Which when the Pagan saw, he wexed4 wroth, And streight him selfe unto the fight addrest, Ne was Sir Artegall behinde: so both Together ran with ready speares in rest. Right in the midst, whereas they brest to brest Should meete, a trap was letten downe to fall Into the floud: streight leapt the Carle5 unblest, Well weening that his foe was falne withall: But he6 was well aware, and leapt before his fall.

1

3

2

4

meedes: dishonest gains. From the Latin word for “profit.” Munera has been likened to Langland’s Lady Meed in Piers Plowman (2.5–17).

hire: payment. wexed: grew. 5 Carle: churl, villain. 6 I.e. Artegall.

Canto Two

13

There being both together in the floud, They each at other tyrannously flew; Ne ought the water cooled their whot bloud, But rather in them kindled choler1 new. But there the Paynim,2 who that use well knew To fight in water, great advantage had, That oftentimes him nigh he overthrew:3 And eke the courser, whereuppon he rad, Could swim like to a fish, whiles he his backe bestrad.

14

Which oddes when as Sir Artegall espide, He saw no way, but close with him in hast; And to him driving strongly downe the tide, Uppon his iron coller griped fast, That with the straint his wesand nigh he brast.4 There they together strove and struggled long, Either the other from his steede to cast; Ne ever Artegall his griple5 strong For any thing wold slacke, but still uppon him hong.

15

As when a Dolphin and a Sele are met, In the wide champian6 of the Ocean plaine: With cruell chaufe7 their courages they whet, The maysterdome of each by force to gaine, And dreadfull battaile twixt them do darraine:8 They snuf, they snort, they bounce, they rage, they rore, That all the sea disturbed with their traine,9 Doth frie with fome above the surges hore.10 Such was betwixt these two the troublesome uprore.

16

So Artegall at length him forst forsake His horses backe, for dread of being drownd, And to his handy swimming him betake. Eftsoones11 him selfe he from his hold unbownd,

1

7

2

8

choler: anger. Paynim: pagan. 3 I.e., Pollente almost overthrew Artegall. 4 wesand: wind-pipe; brast: burst. 5 griple: grip. 6 champian: flat expanse.

chaufe: chafing, rage. darraine: wage. 9 traine: wake. 10 hore: white. 11 Eftsoones: soon after.

21

22

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

And then no ods1 at all in him he fownd: For Artegall in swimming skilfull was, And durst the depth of any water sownd. So ought each Knight, that use2 of perill has, In swimming be expert through waters force to pas. 17

Then very doubtfull was the warres event,3 Uncertaine whether4 had the better side. For both were skild in that experiment,5 And both in armes well traind and throughly tride. But Artegall was better breath’d beside, And towards th’end, grew greater in his might, That his faint foe no longer could abide His puissance, ne beare him selfe upright, But from the water to the land betooke his flight.

18

But Artegall pursewd him still so neare, With bright Chrysaor in his cruell hand, That as his head he gan a litle reare Above the brincke, to tread upon the land, He smote it off, that tumbling on the strand It bit the earth for very fell despight,6 And gnashed with his teeth, as if he band7 High God, whose goodnesse he despaired quight, Or curst the hand, which did that vengeance on him dight.8

19

His corps was carried downe along the Lee,9 Whose waters with his filthy bloud it stayned: But his blasphemous head, that all might see, He pitcht upon a pole on high ordayned; Where many years it afterwards remayned, To be a mirrour to all mighty men,

1 ods: advantage––Pollente cannot gain the upper hand. 2 use: usual experience. 3 event: outcome. 4 whether: which. 5 experiment: trial. 6 Hamilton points out that this image recalls the curse that the serpent shall eat dust

(Gen. 3.14), and is repeated at xi.14 and xii.23. 7 band: cursed. 8 dight: execute. 9 May refer to the Irish river Lee. In 1581, the body of the defeated rebel Sir John of Desmond was hung above the river Lee in Cork. See Variorum, 173.

Canto Two

In whose right hands great power is contayned, That none of them the feeble overren, But alwaies doe their powre within just compasse pen. 20

That done, unto the Castle he did wend, In which the Paynims1 daughter did abide, Guarded of many which did her defend: Of whom he entrance sought, but was denide, And with reprochfull blasphemy defide, Beaten with stones downe from the battilment, That he was forced to withdraw aside; And bad his servant Talus to invent Which way he enter might, without endangerment.

21

Eftsoones2 his Page drew to the Castle gate, And with his iron flale at it let flie, That all the warders it did sore amate,3 The which erewhile4 spake so reprochfully, And made them stoupe, that looked earst5 so hie. Yet still he bet, and bounst uppon the dore, And thundred strokes thereon so hideouslie, That all the peece6 he shaked from the flore, And filled all the house with feare and great uprore.

22

With noise whereof the Lady forth appeared Uppon the Castle wall, and when she saw The daungerous state, in which she stood, she feared The sad effect of her neare overthrow; And gan entreat that iron man below, To cease his outrage, and him faire besought, Sith neither force of stones which they did throw, Nor powr of charms, which she against him wrought, Might otherwise prevaile, or make him cease for ought.

23

But when as yet she saw him to proceede, Unmov’d with praiers, or with piteous thought, She ment him to corrupt with goodly meede;7

1

5

2

6

Paynims: pagan’s. Eftsoones: soon after. 3 amate: dismay. 4 erewhile: formerly.

earst: earlier, once. peece: fortress. 7 meede: bribes.

23

24

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

And causde great sackes with endlesse riches fraught, Unto the battilment to be upbrought, And powred forth over the Castle wall, That she might win some time, though dearly bought Whilest he to gathering of the gold did fall. But he was nothing mov’d, nor tempted therewithall. 24

But still continu’d his assault the more, And layd on load with his huge yron flaile, That at the length he has yrent1 the dore, And made way for his maister to assaile. Who being entred, nought did then availe For wight, against his powre them selves to reare: Each one did flie; their hearts began to faile, And hid them selves in corners here and there; And eke their dame halfe dead did hide her self for feare.

25

Long they her sought, yet no where could they finde her, That sure they ween’d she was escapt away: But Talus, that could like a limehound2 winde her, And all things secrete wisely could bewray,3 At length found out, whereas she hidden lay Under an heape of gold. Thence he her drew By the faire lockes, and fowly did array, Withouten pitty of her goodly hew,4 That Artegall him selfe her seemelesse5 plight did rew.

26

Yet for no pitty would he change the course Of Justice, which in Talus hand did lye; Who rudely hayld6 her forth without remorse, Still holding up her suppliant hands on hye, And kneeling at his feete submissively. But he her suppliant hands, those hands of gold, And eke her feete, those feete of silver trye,7 Which sought unrighteousnesse, and justice sold, Chopt off, and nayld on high, that all might them behold.

1

5

2

6

yrent: torn apart. limehound: hound for hunting boars. 3 bewray: reveal. 4 hew: appearance.

seemelesse: unseemly. hayld: dragged. 7 silver trye: choice silver.

Canto Two

27

Her selfe then tooke he by the sclender wast, In vaine loud crying, and into the flood Over the Castle wall adowne her cast, And there her drowned in the durty mud: But the streame washt away her guilty blood. Thereafter all that mucky pelfe1 he tooke, The spoile of peoples evill gotten good, The which her sire had scrap’t by hooke and crooke, And burning all to ashes, powr’d it downe the brooke.2

28

And lastly all that Castle quite he raced,3 Even from the sole of his foundation, And all the hewen stones thereof defaced, That there mote be no hope of reparation, Nor memory thereof to any nation. All which when Talus throughly had perfourmed, Sir Artegall undid the evill fashion, And wicked customes of that Bridge refourmed. Which done, unto his former journey he retourned.

29

In which they measur’d mickle4 weary way, Till that at length nigh to the sea they drew; By which as they did travell on a day, They saw before them, far as they could vew, Full many people gathered in a crew; Whose great assembly they did much admire. For never there the like resort5 they knew. So towardes them they coasted,6 to enquire What thing so many nations met, did there desire.

30

There they beheld a mighty Gyant7 stand Upon a rocke, and holding forth on hie An huge great paire of ballance in his hand, With which be boasted in his surquedrie,8

1

pelfe: stolen property. See Deut. 9.21. 3 raced: razed. 4 mickle: much. 5 resort: assemblage. 6 coasted: approached. 2

7

25

Often called the Egalitarian Giant or the Giant with the scales, he espouses a revolutionary social program like the communism associated with early modern groups such as the Anabaptists. See Variorum, 336–41; and SE, “radicalism in Spenser.” 8 surquedrie: pride, arrogance.

26

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

That all the world he would weigh equallie, If ought he had the same to counterpoys. For want whereof he weighed vanity,1 And fild his ballaunce full of idle toys: Yet was admired much of fooles, women, and boys. 31

He sayd that he would all the earth uptake, And all the sea, devided each from either: So would he of the fire one ballaunce make, And one of th’ayre, without or wind, or wether: Then would he ballaunce heaven and hell together, And all that did within them all containe; Of all whose weight, he would not misse a fether. And looke what surplus did of each remaine, He would to his2 owne part restore the same againe.

32

For why,3 he sayd they all unequall were, And had encroched uppon others share, Like as the sea (which plaine he shewed there) Had worne the earth, so did the fire the aire, So all the rest did others parts empaire. And so were realmes and nations run awry. All which he undertooke for to repaire, In sort4 as they were formed aunciently; And all things would reduce unto equality.

33

Therefore the vulgar did about him flocke, And cluster thicke unto his leasings5 vaine, Like foolish flies about an hony crocke, In hope by him great benefite to gaine, And uncontrolled freedome to obtaine. All which when Artegall did see, and heare, How he mis-led the simple peoples traine,6 In sdeignfull7 wize he drew unto him neare, And thus unto him spake, without regard or feare.

1

See Ps. 62.9. his: its. The Gyant promises to redistribute all things equally. 3 For why: because. 4 In sort: in the manner. 2

5 leasings: lies, with a secondary meaning of gleanings. 6 traine: course of life, properly ordered sequence. 7 sdeignfull: disdainful.

Canto Two

34

“Thou that presum’st to weigh the world anew, And all things to an equall to restore, In stead of right me seemes great wrong dost shew, And far above thy forces pitch to sore.1 For ere thou limit what is lesse or more In every thing, thou oughtest first to know, What was the poyse2 of every part of yore: And looke then how much it doth overflow, Or faile thereof, so much is more then just to trow.3

35

“For at the first they all created were In goodly measure, by their Makers might, And weighed out in ballaunces so nere, That not a dram was missing of their right,4 The earth was in the middle centre pight,5 In which it doth immoveable abide, Hemd in with waters like a wall in sight; And they with aire, that not a drop can slide: Al which the heavens containe, and in their courses guide.6

36

“Such heavenly justice doth among them raine, That every one doe know their certaine bound, In which they doe these many yeares remaine, And mongst them al no change hath yet beene found.7 But if thou now shouldst weigh them new in pound, We are not sure they would so long remaine: All change is perillous, and all chaunce unsound. Therefore leave off to weigh them all againe, Till we may be assur’d they shall their course retaine.”

1

Artegall charges that the Giant soars above the height his intellectual force can reach. 2 poyse: weight. 3 I.e., the Giant’s measurements will be off because he made arbitrary assumptions as to the original weights, according to Gough (187). 4 See Job 38.4–6; Isa. 40.12; 2 Esd. 4.36. 5 pight: placed. 6 Artegall’s argument relies on Ptolemy’s geocentric theory, even though Coperni-

27

cus challenged it 50 years before the writing of Book Five. The heliocentric theory was slow to gain acceptance, although we cannot say whether or not Spenser agreed with Artegall’s position. 7 Artegall seems to be contradicted by Proem, 4. Gough points out that, in Artegall’s time, the corruption of the heavenly bodies was just beginning. But the Giant’s argument in stanza 32 comes very near to the Proem’s claim that current instabilities in nature parallel a degradation of justice.

28

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

37

“Thou foolishe Elfe” (said then the Gyant wroth) “Seest not, how badly all things present bee, And each estate quite out of order goth?1 The sea it selfe doest though not plainely see Encroch uppon the land there under thee; And th’earth it selfe how daily its increast, By all that dying to it turned be? Were it not good that wrong were then surceast,2 And from the most, that some were given to the least?

38

“Therefore I will throw downe these mountaines hie, And make them levell3 with the lowly plaine: These towring rocks, which reach unto the skie, I will thrust downe into the deepest maine, And as they were, them equalize againe. Tyrants that make men subject to their law, I will suppresse, that they no more may raine; And Lordings curbe, that commons4 over-aw; And all the wealth of rich men to the poore will draw.”

39

“Of things unseene how canst thou deeme5 aright,” Then answered the righteous Artegall, “Sith thou misdeem’st so much of things in sight? What though the sea with waves continuall Doe eate the earth, it is no more6 at all: Ne is the earth the lesse, or loseth ought, For whatsoever from one place doth fall, Is with the tide unto an other brought: For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought.

40

“Likewise the earth is not augmented more, By all that dying into it doe fade. For of the earth they formed were of yore, How ever gay their blossome or their blade Doe flourish now, they into dust shall vade.7

1

4

2

5

goth: goes. surceast: stopped. 3 Perhaps alluding to the emerging term for radical political change. During the Civil War, the Levellers were a political group that sought to level hierarchical society.

commons: the common people. deeme: interpret. 6 no more: not increased. 7 vade: vanish. See Job 14.2; Isa. 40.6–8.

Canto Two

What wrong then is it, if that when they die, They turne to that, whereof they first were made? All in the powre of their great Maker lie: All creatures must obey the voice of the most hie. 41

“They live, they die, like as he doth ordaine, Ne ever any asketh reason why. The hils doe not the lowly dales disdaine; The dales doe not the lofty hils envy. He maketh Kings to sit in soverainty; He maketh subjects to their powre obay;1 He pulleth downe, he setteth up on hy; He gives to this, from that he takes away. For all we have is his: what he list doe, he may.2

42

“What ever thing is done, by him is donne, Ne any may his mighty will withstand; Ne any may his soveraine power shonne, Ne loose that he hath bound with stedfast band. In vaine therefore doest thou now take in hand, To call to count, or weigh his workes anew, Whose counsels depth thou canst not understand, Sith of things subject to thy daily vew Thou doest not know the causes, nor their courses dew.3

43

“For take thy ballaunce, if thou be so wise, And weigh the winde, that under heaven doth blow;4 Or weigh the light, that in the East doth rise; Or weigh the thought, that from mans mind doth flow. But if the weight of these thou canst not show, Weigh but one word which from thy lips doth fall. For how canst thou those greater secrets know, That doest not know the least thing of them all? Ill can he rule the great, that cannot reach the small.”

1

As Todd says, “Indeed this and the next stanza are formed entirely from Holy Writ” (Variorum, 179). Here Spenser echoes several Biblical passages that give divine authority to monarchs, including Prov. 8.15–16; Rom. 13.1–5.

2

See Job 42.2; 1 Sam. 2.6–8. courses dew: just result. 4 See Job 28.25, 2 Esd. 4.5. 3

29

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

44

Therewith the Gyant much abashed sayd; That he of little things made reckoning light, Yet the least word that ever could be layd Within his ballaunce, he could way aright. “Which is” (sayd he1) “more heavy then in weight, The right or wrong, the false or else the trew?” He answered, that he would try it streight, So he the words into his ballaunce threw, But streight the winged words out of his ballaunce flew.

45

Wroth wext he then, and sayd, that words were light,2 Ne would within his ballaunce well abide. But he could justly weigh the wrong or right. “Well then,” sayd Artegall, “let it be tride. First in one ballance set the true aside.” He did so first; and then the false he layd In th’other scale; but still it downe did slide, And by no meane could in the weight3 be stayd. For by no meanes the false will with the truth be wayd.

46

“Now take the right likewise,” sayd Artegale, “And counterpeise4 the same with so much wrong.” So first the right he put into one scale; And then the Gyant strove with puissance strong To fill the other scale with so much wrong. But all the wrongs that he therein could lay, Might not it peise; yet did he labour long, And swat, and chauf’d, and proved5 every way: Yet all the wrongs could not a litle right downe way.

47

Which when he saw, he greatly grew in rage, And almost would his balances have broken: But Artegall him fairely gan asswage, And said; “Be not upon thy balance wroken:6 For they doe nought but right or wrong betoken;7 But in the mind the doome of right must bee;

1

I.e., Artegall. wext: grew; light: unimportant. 3 weight: scales. 4 counterpeise: counterpoise or counterbalance. 2

5 swat, and chauf ’d, and proved: sweated and chafed and tried. 6 wroken: avenged. 7 betoken: signify––objectively, without the mental judgment of the next line.

Canto Two

31

And so likewise of words, the which be spoken, The eare must be the ballance, to decree And judge, whether with truth or falshood they agree. 48

“But set the truth and set the right aside, For they with wrong or falshood will not fare; And put two wrongs together to be tride, Or else two falses, of each equall share; And then together doe them both compare. For truth is one, and right is ever one.” So did he, and then plaine it did appeare, Whether of them the greater were attone.1 But right sate in the middest of the beame alone.2

49

But he the right from thence did thrust away, For it was not the right, which he did seeke; But rather strove extremities to way, Th’one to diminish, th’other for to eeke.3 For of the meane he greatly did misleeke. Whom when so lewdly minded Talus found, Approching nigh unto him cheeke by cheeke, He shouldered him from off the higher ground, And down the rock him throwing, in the sea him dround.4

50

Like as a ship, whom cruell tempest drives Upon a rocke with horrible dismay, Her shattered ribs in thousand peeces rives,5 And spoyling all her geares and goodly ray,6 Does make her selfe misfortunes piteous pray. So downe the cliffe the wretched Gyant tumbled; His battred ballances in peeces lay, His timbered bones all broken rudely rumbled, So was the high aspyring with huge ruine humbled.

51

That when the people, which had there about Long wayted, saw his sudden desolation,

1

Whether: which; attone: at once––i.e., in comparison. 2 According to Gough, Artegall demonstrates the Aristotelian argument that right and wrong cannot be weighed, for there are infinite degrees of falsehood, but truth is one. Only two wrongs can be weighed, and

between these excesses lies the mean. See Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics, 2.6. 3 eeke: increase. 4 Talus’ action resembles Aries, who “shouldred hath the Bull” (Proem, 5). 5 rives: breaks. 6 ray: array.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

They gan to gather in tumultuous rout,1 And mutining, to stirre up civill faction, For certaine losse of so great expectation. For well they hoped to have got great good; And wondrous riches by his innovation. Therefore resolving to revenge his blood, They rose in armes, and all in battell order stood. 52

Which lawlesse multitude him comming too In warlike wise, when Artegall did vew, He much was troubled, ne wist2 what to doo. For loth he was his noble hands t’embrew3 In the base blood of such a rascall crew; And otherwise, if that he should retire, He fear’d least they with shame would him pursew. Therefore he Talus to them sent, t’inquire The cause of their array, and truce for to desire.

53

But soone as they him nigh approching spide, They gan with all their weapons him assay,4 And rudely stroke at him on every side: Yet nought they could him hurt, ne ought dismay. But when at them he with his flaile gan lay, He like a swarme of flyes them overthrew; Ne any of them durst come in his way, But here and there before his presence flew, And hid themselves in holes and bushes from his view.

54

As when a Faulcon hath with nimble flight Flowne at a flush5 of Ducks, foreby the brooke, The trembling foule dismayd with dreadfull sight Of death, the which them almost overtooke, Doe hide themselves from her astonying6 looke, Amongst the flags7 and covert round about. When Talus saw they all the field forsooke And none appear’d of all that raskall rout,8 To Artegall he turn’d, and went with him throughout.

1

5

2

6

rout: mob. wist: knew. 3 embrew: plunge into, stain. 4 assay: attack.

flush: flight of startled birds. astonying: petrifying. 7 flags: reeds. 8 rout: mob.

Canto Three The spousals of faire Florimell, where turney many knights: There Braggadochio is uncas’d in all the Ladies sights.

1

After long stormes and tempests overblowne, The sunne at length his joyous face doth cleare: So when as fortune all her spight hath showne, Some blisfull houres at last must needes appeare; Else should afflicted wights oftimes despeire. So comes it now to Florimell 1 by tourne, After long sorrowes suffered whyleare,2 In which captiv’d she many moneths did mourne, To tast of joy, and to wont3 pleasures to retourne.

2

Who being freed from Proteus 4 cruell band By Marinell, was unto him affide,5 And by him brought againe to Faerie land; Where he her spous’d, and made his joyous bride. The time and place was blazed farre and wide; And solemne feasts and giusts6 ordain’d therefore. To which there did resort from every side Of Lords and Ladies infinite great store; Ne any Knight was absent, that brave courage bore.

3

To tell the glorie of the feast that day, The goodly service, the devicefull sights,7 The bridegromes state, the brides most rich aray,

1

III.viii.30; and Homer, Odyssey, 4.351–93. Proteus imprisoned Florimell beneath the waves (III.viii.30–42) until she was released by command of Neptune (IV.xii.32). 5 affide: betrothed. 6 giusts: jousts. 7 devicefull sights: sights full of devices, such as pageants and spectacles.

Recalling Flora, the goddess of flowers, and the Latin word for honey, mel. For the background on Florimell and Marinell, see ii.2.9n.; and Introduction, 10. 2 whyleare: formerly. 3 wont: accustomed. 4 A god of the sea, Proteus has the gifts of prophecy and changing shapes. See

33

34

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

The pride of Ladies, and the worth of knights, The royall banquets, and the rare delights Were worke fit for an Herauld, not for me: But for so much as to my lot here lights, That with this present treatise doth agree, True vertue to advance, shall here recounted bee.1 4

When all men had with full satietie Of meates and drinkes their appetites suffiz’d, To deedes of armes and proofe of chevalrie They gan themselves addresse, full rich aguiz’d,2 As each one had his furnitures3 deviz’d. And first of all issu’d Sir Marinell, And with him sixe knights more, which enterpriz’d To chalenge all in right of Florimell, And to maintaine, that she all others did excell.4

5

The first of them was hight Sir Orimont, A noble Knight, and tride in hard assayes: The second had to name Sir Bellisont, But second unto none in prowesse prayse; The third was Brunell, famous in his dayes; The fourth Ecastor, of exceeding might; The fift Armeddan, skild in lovely layes;5 The sixt was Lansack, a redoubted Knight: All sixe well seene6 in armes, and prov’d in many a fight.

6

And them against came all that list to giust, From every coast and countrie under sunne: None was debard, but all had leave that lust.7 The trompets sound; then all together ronne.

1

The herald traditionally describes the guests and the details of the festival. This is one of the rare instances in which the poet speaks in the first person. He distinguishes between his poem’s moral aim of advancing virtue and the more frivolous details of chivalric romance. 2 aguiz’d: arrayed. 3 furnitures: armor and equipment.

4 In the tournament the knights are fighting

to prove who represents the most beautiful and virtuous lady. This tradition is based on the same logic as the trial by battle: heaven will assure a just conclusion. 5 layes: love songs. 6 seene: skilled. These knights may have been complimentary references to courtiers, according to Hamilton. 7 lust: desired, chose.

Canto Three

35

Full many deedes of armes that day were donne, And many knights unhorst, and many wounded, As fortune fell; yet litle lost or wonne: But all that day the greatest prayse redounded To Marinell, whose name the Heralds loud resounded. 7

The second day, so soone as morrow light Appear’d in heaven, into the field they came, And there all day continew’d cruell fight, With divers fortune fit for such a game, In which all strove with perill to winne fame. Yet whether side was victor, note1 be ghest: But at the last the trompets did proclame That Marinell that day deserved best. So they disparted were, and all men went to rest.

8

The third day came, that should due tryall lend Of all the rest, and then this warlike crew Together met, of all to make an end. There Marinell great deeds of armes did shew; And through the thickest like a Lyon flew, Rashing off helmes, and ryving2 plates a sonder, That every one his daunger did eschew. So terribly his dreadfull strokes did thonder, That all men stood amaz’d, and at his might did wonder.

9

But what on earth can alwayes happie stand? The greater prowesse greater perils find. So farre he past amongst his enemies band, That they have him enclosed so behind, As by no meanes he can himselfe outwind. And now perforce they have him prisoner taken; And now they doe with captive bands him bind; And now they lead him thence, of all forsaken, Unlesse some succour had in time him overtaken.

10

It fortun’d whylest they were thus ill beset, Sir Artegall into the Tilt-yard came, With Braggadochio,3 whom he lately met

1 2

whether: which; note: could not. Rashing: slashing; ryving: tearing.

3

Braggart or boaster, with an Italian suffix. Braggadochio is a parodic figure for

36

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Upon the way, with that his snowy Dame. Where when he understood by common fame,1 What evill hap to Marinell betid, He much was mov’d at so unworthie shame, And streight that boaster prayd, with whom he rid, To change his shield with him, to be the better hid. 11

So forth he went, and soone them over hent,2 Where they were leading Marinell away, Whom he assayld with dreadlesse hardiment, And forst the burden of their prize to stay. They were an hundred knights of that array; Of which th’one halfe upon himselfe did set, Th’other stayd behind to gard the pray. But he ere long the former fiftie bet;3 And from th’other fiftie soone the prisoner fet.4

12

So backe he brought Sir Marinell againe; Whom having quickly arm’d againe anew, They both together joyned might and maine, To set afresh on all the other crew. Whom with sore havocke soone they overthrew, And chaced quite out of the field, that none Against them durst his head to perill shew. So were they left Lords of the field alone: So Marinell by him was rescu’d from his fone.5

13

Which when he had perform’d, then backe againe To Braggadochio did his shield restore: Who all this while behind him did remaine, Keeping there close with him in pretious store That his false Ladie,6 as ye heard afore. Then did the trompets sound, and Judges rose, And all these knights, which that day armour bore,

knighthood who causes confusion in Books Two, Three, and Four. He appears at a tournament held by the knight Satyrane, where he gains the companionship of the False Florimell, an imposter made of snow (IV.v.26). Braggadocchio resembles Ariosto’s Martano (Orlando, 17–18). 1 fame: report.

2

over hent: overtook. bet: beat. 4 fet: fetched. 5 fone: foes. 6 I.e., keeping the False Florimell hidden as a precious treasure. 3

Canto Three

37

Came to the open hall, to listen whose The honour of the prize should be adjudg’d by those. 14

And thether also came in open sight Fayre Florimell, into the common hall, To greet his guerdon1 unto every knight, And best to him, to whom the best should fall. Then for that stranger knight they loud did call, To whom that day they should the girlond yield. Who came not forth: but for Sir Artegall Came Braggadochio, and did shew his shield, Which bore the Sunne brode blazed in a golden field.

15

The sight whereof did all with gladnesse fill: So unto him they did addeeme2 the prise Of all that Tryumph. Then the trompets shrill Don Braggadochios name resounded thrise: So courage lent a cloke to cowardise. And then to him came fayrest Florimell, And goodly gan to greet his brave emprise,3 And thousand thankes him yeeld, that had so well Approv’d that day, that she all others did excell.

16

To whom the boaster, that all knights did blot, With proud disdaine did scornefull answere make; That what he did that day, he did it not For her, but for his owne dear Ladies sake, Whom on his perill he did undertake, Both her and eke all others to excell: And further did uncomely speaches crake.4 Much did his words the gentle Ladie quell,5 And turn’d aside for shame to heare, what he did tell.

17

Then forth he brought his snowy Florimele, Whom Trompart 6 had in keeping there beside, Covered from peoples gazement with a vele.

1

greet his guerdon: celebrate the reward. addeeme: award. 3 emprise: enterprise. 4 crake: speak boastfully, speak in a grating cry as does a crow. 2

5

quell: disconcert. Suggesting deception, from “trump,” meaning to cheat. Also suggesting pomp and flattery, from “trumpet.” Trompart swears allegiance to Braggadochio in Book Two and acts as his servant. 6

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Whom when discovered they had throughly eide, With great amazement they were stupefide; And said, that surely Florimell it was, Or if it were not Florimell so tride,1 That Florimell her selfe she then did pas. So feeble skill2 of perfect things the vulgar has. 18

Which when as Marinell beheld likewise, He was therewith exceedingly dismayd; Ne wist he what to thinke, or to devise, But like as one, whom feends had made affrayd, He long astonisht stood, ne ought he sayd, Ne ought he did, but with fast fixed eies He gazed still upon that snowy mayd; Whom ever as he did the more avize,3 The more to be true Florimell he did surmize.

19

As when two sunnes appeare in the azure skye,4 Mounted in Phoebus charet fierie bright, Both darting forth faire beames to each mans eye, And both adorn’d with lampes of flaming light, All that behold so strange prodigious sight, Not knowing natures worke, nor what to weene, Are rapt with wonder, and with rare affright. So stood Sir Marinell, when he had seene The semblant5 of this false by his faire beauties Queene.

20

All which when Artegall, who all this while Stood in the preasse6 close covered, well advewed, And saw that boasters pride and gracelesse guile, He could no longer beare, but forth issewed, And unto all himselfe there open shewed, And to the boaster said; “Thou losell7 base,

1

so tride: after an inspection. skill: power of discrimination. 3 avize: look at. 4 Referring to the phenomenon of the parhelion, intensified solar light that was 2

taken to be a reflection of the sun, or a mock sun. It was thought to be an omen. 5 semblant: appearance, resemblance. 6 preasse: crowd. 7 losell: scoundrel.

Canto Three

39

That hast with borrowed plumes thy selfe endewed, And others worth with leasings1 doest deface, When they are all restor’d, thou shalt rest in disgrace. 21

“That shield, which thou doest beare, was it indeed, Which this dayes honour sav’d to Marinell; But not that arme, nor thou the man I reed,2 Which didst that service unto Florimell. For proofe shew forth thy sword, and let it tell, What strokes, what dreadfull stoure3 it stird this day: Or shew the wounds, which unto thee befell; Or shew the sweat, with which thou diddest sway So sharpe a battell, that so many did dismay.

22

“But this the sword, which wrought those cruell stounds,4 And this the arme, the which that shield did beare, And these the signes,” (so shewed forth his wounds) “By which that glorie gotten doth appeare. As for this Ladie, which he sheweth here, Is not (I wager) Florimell at all; But some fayre Franion, fit for such a fere,5 That by misfortune in his hand did fall.” For proofe whereof, he bad them Florimell forth call.

23

So forth the noble Ladie was ybrought, Adorn’d with honor and all comely grace: Whereto her bashfull shamefastnesse ywrought A great increase in her faire blushing face; As roses did with lillies interlace. For of those words, the which that boaster threw, She inly yet conceived great disgrace. Whom when as all the people such did vew, They shouted loud, and signes of gladnesse all did shew.

24

Then did he set her by that snowy one, Like the true saint beside the image set, Of both their beauties to make paragone,6

1

leasings: lies. reed: judge. 3 stoure: storm. 4 stounds: fierce attacks. 2

5

Franion: loose, wanton person; fere: companion, consort. 6 paragone: comparison.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

And triall, whether1 should the honor get. Streightway so soone as both together met, Th’enchaunted Damzell vanisht into nought: Her snowy substance melted as with heat, Ne of that goodly hew2 remayned ought, But th’emptie girdle, which about her wast was wrought.3 25

As when the daughter of Thaumantes faire,4 Hath in a watry cloud displayed wide Her goodly bow, which paints the liquid ayre; That all men wonder at her colours pride; All suddenly, ere one can looke aside, The glorious picture vanisheth away, Ne any token doth thereof abide: So did this Ladies goodly forme decay, And into nothing goe, ere one could it bewray.5

26

Which when as all that present were, beheld, They stricken were with great astonishment, And their faint harts with senselesse horrour queld,6 To see the thing, that seem’d so excellent, So stolen from their fancies wonderment; That what of it became, none understood. And Braggadochio selfe7 with dreriment So daunted was in his despeyring mood, That like a lifelesse corse immoveable he stood.

27

But Artegall that golden belt uptooke, The which of all her spoyle was onely left; Which was not hers, as many it mistooke, But Florimells owne girdle, from her reft,8 While she was flying, like a weary weft,9 From that foule monster, which did her compell

1

whether: which. hew: appearance. 3 The False Florimell was awarded Florimell’s girdle at Satyrane’s tournament (IV.v.14). Given that only a chaste woman can wear the girdle, it is unclear how the False Florimell has it on. 2

4 Iris, the rainbow goddess. See Metamorphoses, 11.647; Virgil, Aeneid, 9.5. 5 bewray: point out. 6 queld: quailed, withered. 7 I.e., himself. 8 reft: robbed. See ii.3.n. 9 weft: waif, outcast, or homeless person.

Canto Three

41

To perils great; which he unbuckling eft,1 Presented to the fayrest Florimell; Who round about her tender wast it fitted well. 28

Full many Ladies often had assayd, About their middles that faire belt to knit; And many a one suppos’d to be a mayd: Yet it to none of all their loynes would fit, Till Florimell about her fastned it. Such power it had, that to no womans wast By any skill or labour it would fit, Unlesse that she were continent and chast, But it would lose or breake, that many had disgrast.

29

Whilest thus they busied were bout Florimell, And boastfull Braggadochio to defame, Sir Guyon as by fortune then befell, Forth from the thickest preasse of people came, His owne good steed, which he had stolne, to clame;2 And th’one hand seizing on his golden bit, With th’other drew his sword: for with the same He ment the thiefe there deadly to have smit: And had he not bene held, he nought had fayld of it.

30

Thereof great hurly burly moved was Throughout the hall, for that same warlike horse. For Braggadochio would not let him pas; And Guyon would him algates3 have perforse, Or it approve4 upon his carrion corse. Which troublous stirre when Artegall perceived, He nigh them drew to stay th’avengers forse, And gan inquire, how was that steed bereaved,5 Whether by might extort, or else by slight deceaved.6

1

eft: afterward. Sir Guyon is the hero of Book Two, the Legend of Temperaunce. Braggadochio steals his horse and spear (II.iii.4). 3 algates: by all means. 2

4

approve: prove, settle the score. bereaved: stolen. 6 I.e., whether stolen by might or by deception. 5

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

31

Who all that piteous storie, which befell About that wofull couple, which were slaine, And their young bloodie babe to him gan tell;1 With whom whiles he did in the wood remaine, His horse purloyned was by subtill traine:2 For which he chalenged the thiefe to fight. But he for nought could him thereto constraine. For as the death he hated such despight,3 And rather had to lose, then trie in armes his right.

32

Which Artegall well hearing, though no more By law of armes there neede ones right to trie, As was the wont of warlike knights of yore, Then that his foe should him the field denie,4 Yet further right by tokens to descrie, He askt, what privie tokens he did beare.5 “If that” (said Guyon) “may you satisfie, Within his mouth a blacke spot doth appeare, Shapt like a horses shoe, who list to seeke it there.”

33

Whereof to make due tryall, one did take The horse in hand, within his mouth to looke: But with his heeles so sorely he him strake, That all his ribs he quite in peeces broke, That never word from that day forth he spoke. Another that would seeme to have more wit, Him by the bright embrodered hedstall6 tooke: But by the shoulder him so sore he bit, That he him maymed quite, and all his shoulder split.

34

Ne he his mouth would open unto wight, Untill that Guyon selfe unto him spake, And called Brigadore 7 (so was he hight)

1

Guyon is giving aid to a babe soaked in the blood of his slaughtered parents when Braggadochio steals his horse (II.i.35–55). 2 traine: trick. 3 despight: open defiance––i.e., Guyon’s challenge. 4 According to the rules of chivalry, Braggadochio forfeits his claim when he refuses to fight.

5

Although Braggadochio has lost his claim to the horse, Artegall seeks further evidence, just as he rejects the justice of combat conventions in i.25. 6 hedstall: halter. 7 A version of Orlando’s horse, Brigliadoro, meaning, “bridle of gold” in Italian.

Canto Three

43

Whose voice so soone as he did undertake,1 Eftsoones2 he stood as still as any stake, And suffred all his secret marke to see: And when as he him nam’d, for joy he brake His bands, and follow’d him with gladfull glee, And friskt, and flong aloft, and louted3 low on knee. 35

Thereby Sir Artegall did plaine areed,4 That unto him the horse belong’d, and sayd; “Lo there Sir Guyon, take to you the steed, As he with golden saddle is arayd; And let that losell,5 plainely now displayd, Hence fare on foot, till he an horse have gayned.” But the proud boaster gan his doome upbrayd, And him revil’d, and rated, and disdayned, That judgement so unjust against him had ordayned.

36

Much was the knight incenst with his lewd word, To have revenged that his villeny; And thrise did lay his hand upon his sword, To have him slaine, or dearely doen aby.6 But Guyon did his choler pacify, Saying, “Sir knight, it would dishonour bee To you, that are our judge of equity, To wreake your wrath on such a carle7 as hee It’s punishment enough, that all his shame doe see.”8

37

So did he mitigate Sir Artegall, But Talus by the backe the boaster hent,9 And drawing him out of the open hall, Upon him did inflict this punishment. First he his beard did shave, and fowly shent:10

1

undertake: hear. Eftsoones: immediately. 3 louted: bowed. 4 areed: judge. 5 losell: scoundrel. 6 aby: pay (a penalty). 7 carle: churl. 2

8

This is the only occasion in Book Five when Artegall has a personal interest in a judgment. He grows angry and seeks revenge, so that Guyon, the Knight of Temperance, must remind him to practice equity. On equity, see Introduction, 2. 9 hent: seized. 10 shent: disgraced, disfigured.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Then from him reft his shield, and it renverst,1 And blotted out his armes with falshood blent, And himselfe baffuld, and his armes unherst,2 And broke his sword in twaine, and all his armour sperst.3 38

The whiles his guilefull groome was fled away: But vaine it was to thinke from him to flie.4 Who overtaking him did disaray, And all his face deform’d with infamie, And out of court him scourged openly. So ought all faytours,5 that true knighthood shame, And armes dishonour with base villanie, From all brave knights be banisht with defame: For oft their lewdnes blotteth good deserts with blame.

39

Now when these counterfeits were thus uncased Out of the foreside6 of their forgerie, And in the sight of all men cleane disgraced, All gan to jest and gibe full merilie At the remembrance of their knaverie. Ladies can7 laugh at Ladies, Knights at Knights, To thinke with how great vaunt of braverie He them abused, through his subtill slights, And what a glorious shew he made in all their sights.

40

There leave we them in pleasure and repast, Spending their joyous dayes and gladfull nights, And taking usurie of time forepast,8 With all deare delices9 and rare delights, Fit for such Ladies and such lovely knights: And turne we here to this faire furrowes end Our wearie yokes, to gather fresher sprights,10 That when as time to Artegall shall tend, We on his first adventure may him forward send.

1

5

2

6

renverst: turned upside down. baffuld: dishonored—baffling was a ritualistic way of shaming a knight; unherst: disassembled. 3 sperst: dispersed. 4 Trompart escapes, but Braggadochio cannot get away from Talus.

faytours: imposters. foreside: façade, appearance. 7 can: did. 8 I.e., taking profit or reward from earlier labors. 9 delices: pleasures, delicacies. 10 sprights: spirits.

Canto Four Artegall dealeth right betwixt two brethren that doe strive, Saves Terpine from the gallow tree, and doth from death reprive.

1

Who so upon him selfe will take the skill True Justice unto people to divide,1 Had neede have mightie hands, for to fulfill That, which he doth with righteous doome decide, And for to maister wrong and puissant pride. For vaine it is to deeme of things aright, And makes wrong doers justice to deride, Unlesse it be perform’d with dreadlesse might. For powre is the right hand of Justice truely hight.

2

Therefore whylome to knights of great emprise2 The charge of Justice given was in trust, That they might execute her judgements wise, And with their might beat downe licentious lust, Which proudly did impugne her sentence just. Whereof no braver president3 this day Remaines on earth, preserv’d from yron rust Of rude oblivion, and long times decay, Then this of Artegall, which here we have to say.

3

Who having lately left that lovely payre, Enlincked fast in wedlockes loyall bond, Bold Marinell with Florimell the fayre, With whom great feast and goodly glee he fond, Departed from the Castle of the strond, To follow his adventures first intent,

1 divide: dispense, sort out––but possibly with an underlying tone of violence.

2 3

45

emprise: glory, prowess. president: precedent, example.

46

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Which long agoe he taken had in hond: Ne wight with him for his assistance went, But that great yron groome, his gard and government.1 4

With whom as he did passe by the sea shore, He chaunst to come, whereas two comely Squires, Both brethren, whom one wombe together bore, But stirred up with different desires, Together strove, and kindled wrathfull fires: And them beside two seemely2 damzels stood, By all meanes seeking to asswage their ires, Now with faire words; but words did little good, Now with sharpe threats; but threats the more increast their mood.

5

And there before them stood a Coffer3 strong, Fast bound on every side with iron bands, But seeming to have suffred mickle4 wrong, Either by being wreckt uppon the sands, Or being carried farre from forraine lands. Seem’d that for it these Squires at ods did fall, And bent against them selves their cruell hands. But evermore, those Damzels did forestall Their furious encounter, and their fiercenesse pall.5

6

But firmely fixt they were, with dint of sword, And battailes doubtfull proofe their rights to try, Ne other end their fury would afford, But what to them Fortune would justify.6 So stood they both in readinesse: thereby To joyne the combate with cruell intent; When Artegall arriving happily,7 Did stay a while their greedy bickerment, Till he had questioned the cause of their dissent.

1 government: means of governing or executing his justice. See viii.3.9. 2 seemely: beautiful. 3 Coffer: chest. 4 mickle: much.

5

pall: diminish. The brothers seek justice through ordeal by combat, which is called doubtful because it relies on Fortune or chance. Cf. i.25. 7 happily: by good luck. 6

Canto Four

7

To whom the elder did this aunswere frame; “Then weete1 ye Sir, that we two brethren be, To whom our sire, Milesio2 by name, Did equally bequeath his lands in fee,3 Two Ilands, which ye there before you see Not farre in sea; of which the one appeares But like a little Mount of small degree; Yet was as great and wide ere many yeares, As that same other Isle, that greater bredth now beares.4

8

“But tract of time, that all things doth decay, And this devouring Sea, that naught doth spare, The most part of my land hath washt away, And throwne it up unto my brothers share: So his encreased, but mine did empaire. Before which time I lov’d, as was my lot, That further mayd, hight Philtera5 the faire, With whom a goodly doure6 I should have got, And should have joyned bene to her in wedlocks knot.

9

“Then did my younger brother Amidas7 Love that same other Damzell, Lucy bright, To whom but little dowre allotted was; Her vertue was the dowre, that did delight. What better dowre can to a dame be hight?8 But now when Philtra saw my lands decay, And former livelod9 fayle, she left me quight, And to my brother did ellope streight way: Who taking her from me, his owne love left astray.

10

“She seeing then her selfe forsaken so, Through dolorous despaire, which she conceyved, Into the Sea her selfe did headlong throw,

1

weete: know. Gough suggests a relation to Milesius of Irish legend. Milesius was a Scythian invader of Ireland, whose sons quarreled over the island. 3 in fee: as a permanent inheritance. 4 The brothers’ two equal islands have become unequal through erosion. This judicial problem is called alluvion, in which the 2

47

movement of water causes the formation of new land, setting off property disputes. 5 Combining the Greek word for “love” with the Latin word for “land.” 6 doure: dowry. 7 Combining Greek and Latin roots, suggests “fond of possessions.” 8 hight: promised. 9 livelod: livelihood.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Thinking to have her griefe by death bereaved. But see how much her purpose was deceaved. Whilest thus amidst the billowes1 beating of her Twixt life and death, long to and fro she weaved, She chaunst unwares to light uppon this coffer, Which to her in that daunger hope of life did offer. 11

“The wretched mayd that earst2 desir’d to die, When as the paine of death she tasted had, And but halfe seene his ugly visnomie,3 Gan to repent, that she had beene so mad, For any death to chaunge life though most bad: And catching hold of this Sea-beaten chest, The lucky Pylot of her passage sad, After long tossing in the seas distrest, Her weary barke at last uppon mine Isle did rest.

12

“Where I by chaunce then wandring on the shore, Did her espy, and through my good endevour From dreadfull mouth of death, which threatned sore Her to have swallow’d up, did helpe to save her. She then in recompence of that great favour, Which I on her bestowed, bestowed on me The portion of that good, which Fortune gave her, Together with her selfe in dowry free; Both goodly portions, but of both the better she.4

13

“Yet in this coffer, which she with her brought, Great threasure sithence5 we did finde contained; Which as our owne we tooke, and so it thought. But this same other Damzell since hath fained, That to her selfe that threasure appertained; And that she did transport the same by sea, To bring it to her husband new ordained, But suffred cruell shipwracke by the way. But whether it be so or no, I can not say.

1

billowes: waves. earst: earlier. 3 visnomie: physiognomy—face, appearance. 4 This raises the judicial problem of salvage. 2

Under the laws of salvage, the older brother may claim the coffer as wreckage––and he seems justified in claiming Lucy by the same right. 5 sithence: afterward.

Canto Four

14

“But whether it indeede be so or no, This doe I say, that what so good or ill Or God or Fortune unto me did throw, Not wronging any other by my will, I hold mine owne, and so will hold it still. And though my land he first did winne away, And then my love (though now it little skill,)1 Yet my good lucke he shall not likewise pray;2 But I will it defend, whilst ever that I may.”

15

So having sayd, the younger did ensew;3 “Full true it is, what so about our land My brother here declared hath to you: But not for it this ods twixt us doth stand, But for this threasure throwne uppon his strand;4 Which well I prove, as shall appeare by triall, To be this maides, with whom I fastned hand,5 Known by good markes, and perfect good espiall,6 Therefore it ought be rendred her without deniall.”

16

When they thus ended had, the Knight began; “Certes your strife were easie to accord, Would ye remit it to some righteous man.” “Unto your selfe,” said they, “we give our word, To bide what judgement ye shall us afford.” “Then for assuraunce to my doome to stand, Under my foote let each lay downe his sword, And then you shall my sentence understand.” So each of them layd downe his sword out of his hand.

17

Then Artegall thus to the younger sayd; “Now tell me Amidas, if that ye may, Your brothers land the which the sea hath layd Unto your part, and pluckt from his away, By what good right doe you withhold this day?” “What other right” (quoth he) “should you esteeme,

1

4

2

5

little skill: little matters. pray: prey upon. 3 ensew: follow.

strand: beach. fastned hand: betrothed. 6 espiall: observation.

49

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

But that the sea it to my share did lay?” “Your right is good” (sayd he) “and so I deeme, That what the sea unto you sent, your own should seeme.” 18

Then turning to the elder thus he sayd; “Now Bracidas 1 let this likewise be showne. Your brothers threasure, which from him is strayd, Being the dowry of his wife well knowne, By what right doe you claime to be your owne?” “What other right” (quoth he) “should you esteeme, But that the sea hath it unto me throwne?” “Your right is good” (sayd he) “and so I deeme, That what the sea unto you sent, your own should seeme.

19

“For equall right in equall things doth stand, For what the mighty Sea hath once possest, And plucked quite from all possessors hand, Whether by rage of waves, that never rest, Or else by wracke, that wretches hath distrest, He may dispose by his imperiall might, As thing at randon left, to whom he list. So Amidas, the land was yours first hight, And so the threasure yours is Bracidas by right.”

20

When he his sentence thus pronounced had, Both Amidas and Philtra were displeased: But Bracidas and Lucy were right glad, And on the threasure by that judgement seased.2 So was their discord by this doome appeased, And each one had his right. Then Artegall When as their sharpe contention he had ceased, Departed on his way, as did befall, To follow his old quest, the which him forth did call.

21

So as he travelled uppon the way, He chaunst to come, where happily3 he spide A rout of many people farre away;

1 The Greek roots mean “few possessions,” as Hamilton suggests, or “possessions thrown up” (from the sea). See Variorum, 195.

2 3

seased: siezed. happily: by chance.

Canto Four

51

To whom his course he hastily applide, To weete1 the cause of their assemblaunce wide. To whom when he approched neare in sight, (An uncouth sight) he plainely then descride To be a troupe of women warlike dight,2 With weapons in their hands, as ready for to fight. 22

And in the midst of them he saw a Knight, With both his hands behinde him pinnoed3 hard, And round about his necke an halter tight, As ready for the gallow tree prepard: His face was covered, and his head was bar’d, That who he was, uneath4 was to descry; And with full heavy heart with them he far’d, Griev’d to the soule, and groning inwardly, That he of womens hands so base a death should dy.

23

But they like tyrants, mercilesse the more, Rejoyced at his miserable case, And him reviled, and reproched sore With bitter taunts, and termes of vile disgrace. Now when as Artegall arriv’d in place, Did aske, what cause brought that man to decay, They round about him gan to swarme apace, Meaning on him their cruell hands to lay, And to have wrought unwares some villanous assay.5

24

But he was soone aware of their ill minde, And drawing backe deceived their intent; Yet though him selfe did shame on womankinde His mighty hand to shend,6 he Talus sent To wrecke on them their follies hardyment: Who with few sowces7 of his yron flale,

1

weete: know. dight: dressed. 3 pinnoed: pinned, pinioned. 4 uneath: difficult. 5 assay: attempt. 2

6

to shend: to punish, injure––i.e., Artegall was ashamed to attack women with his own hand. However, the chivalric conviction later falls away (iv.41ff.). 7 sowces: blows.

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Dispersed all their troupe incontinent,1 And sent them home to tell a piteous tale, Of their vaine prowesse, turned to their proper bale.2 25

But that same wretched man, ordaynd to die, They left behind them, glad to be so quit: Him Talus tooke out of perplexitie, And horrour of fowle death for Knight unfit, Who more then losse of life ydreaded it;3 And him restoring unto living light,4 So brought unto his Lord, where he did sit, Beholding all that womanish weake fight; Whom soone as he beheld, he knew, and thus behight.5

26

“Sir Turpine,6 haplesse man, what make you here? Or have you lost your selfe, and your discretion, That ever in this wretched case ye were? Or have ye yeelded you to proude oppression Of womens powre, that boast of mens subjection? Or else what other deadly dismall day Is falne on you, by heavens hard direction, That ye were runne so fondly far astray, As for to lead your selfe unto your owne decay?”

27

Much was the man confounded in his mind, Partly with shame, and partly with dismay, That all astonisht he him selfe did find, And little had for his excuse to say, But onely thus; “Most haplesse well ye may Me justly terme, that to this shame am brought, And made the scorne of Knighthod this same day. But who can scape, what his owne fate hath wrought? The worke of heavens will surpasseth humaine thought.”7

1

4

2

5

incontinent: immediately. proper bale: own suffering. 3 Hanging was used with criminals, and so was especially disgraceful to knights.

See Ps. 56.13. behight: addressed. 6 Suggests the Latin word for “shameful.” 7 I.e., heaven’s will surpasses human thought.

Canto Four

28

“Right true: but faulty1 men use oftentimes To attribute their folly unto fate, And lay on heaven the guilt of their owne crimes.2 But tell, Sir Terpin, ne let you amate3 Your misery, how fell ye in this state.” “Then sith ye needs” (quoth he) “will know my shame, And all the ill, which chaunst to me of late, I shortly will to you rehearse the same, In hope ye will not turne misfortune to my blame.

29

“Being desirous (as all Knights are woont) Through hard adventures deedes of armes to try, And after fame and honour for to hunt, I heard report that farre abrode did fly, That a proud Amazon did late defy All the brave Knights, that hold of Maidenhead,4 And unto them wrought all the villany, That she could forge in her malicious head, Which some hath put to shame, and many done be dead.5

30

“The cause, they say, of this her cruell hate, Is for the sake of Bellodant 6 the bold, To whom she bore most fervent love of late, And wooed him by all the waies she could: But when she saw at last, that he ne would For ought or nought be wonne unto her will, She turn’d her love to hatred manifold, And for his sake vow’d to doe all the ill Which she could doe to Knights, which now she doth fulfill.

31

“For all those Knights, the which by force or guile She doth subdue, she fowly doth entreate.7 First she doth them of warlike armes despoile,

1

faulty: guilty. But Artegall will later do exactly this (xi.41). Also see A View, 11–12. 3 amate: dismay––i.e., do not let your misery dismay you. 4 I.e., that maintain allegiance to the Order of Maidenhead, the order of knights who serve Gloriana. See I.vii.46. 2

53

5 I.e., put to death. Amazons appear throughout classical and medieval literature. Spenser borrows chiefly from Diodorus Siculus (Bibliotheca Historica, 2.4–6, 3.52–55) and from Ariosto’s Amazon queen Orontea (Orlando, 20). 6 Suggesting in Latin “one given to war.” 7 entreate: treat.

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And cloth in womens weedes:1 And then with threat Doth them compell to worke, to earne their meat, To spin, to card, to sew, to wash, to wring; Ne doth she give them other thing to eat, But bread and water, or like feeble thing, Them to disable from revenge adventuring.2 32

“But if through stout disdaine of manly mind, Any her proud observaunce3 will withstand, Uppon that gibbet,4 which is there behind, She causeth them be hang’d up out of hand; In which condition I right now did stand. For being overcome by her in fight, And put to that base service of her band,5 I rather chose to die in lives despight, Then lead that shamefull life, unworthy of a Knight.”

33

“How hight that Amazon?” (sayd Artegall) “And where, and how far hence does she abide?” “Her name” (quoth he) “they Radigund 6 doe call, A Princesse of great powre, and greater pride, And Queene of Amazons, in armes well tride, And sundry battels, which she hath atchieved With great successe, that her hath glorifide, And made her famous, more then is believed; Ne would I it have ween’d, had I not late it prieved.”7

34

“Now sure” (said he) “and by the faith that I To Maydenhead and noble knighthood owe, I will not rest, till I her might doe trie, And venge the shame, that she to Knights doth show. Therefore Sir Terpin from you lightly throw

1

weedes: clothes. Artegall’s cross-dressing and spinning is a shame traditionally inflicted by Amazons. It also recalls Hercules under the influence of Omphale. See Ovid, Fasti, 2.305–58. 3 observaunce: rule. 4 gibbet: gallows. 2

5

band: bond. May recall the Greek words for “reckless” and “woman,” or the Latin word meaning “to offend.” There is a St. Radigund, famous for preserving her chastity by refusing to marry a prince. See SE, “Radigund.” 7 prieved: proved. 6

Canto Four

55

This squalid weede,1 the patterne of dispaire, And wend with me, that ye may see and know, How Fortune will your ruin’d name repaire, And knights of Maidenhead, whose praise she would empaire.” 35

With that, like one that hopelesse was repry’vd2 From deathes dore, at which he lately lay, Those yron fetters, wherewith he was gyv’d,3 The badges of reproch, he threw away, And nimbly did him dight4 to guide the way Unto the dwelling of that Amazone. Which was from thence not past a mile or tway: A goodly citty and a mighty one, The which of her owne name she called Radegone.5

36

Where they arriving, by the watchmen were Descried streight, who all the citty warned, How that three warlike persons did appeare, Of which the one him seem’d a Knight all armed, And th’other two well likely to have harmed. Eftsoones the people all to harnesse6 ran, And like a sort of Bees in clusters swarmed: Ere long their Queene her selfe, halfe like a man7 Came forth into the rout,8 and them t’array began.

37

And now the Knights being arrived neare, Did beat uppon the gates to enter in, And at the Porter, skorning them so few, Threw many threats, if they the towne did win, To teare his flesh in peeces for his sin. Which when as Radigund there comming heard, Her heart for rage did grate, and teeth did grin:9 She bad that streight the gates should be unbard, And to them way to make, with weapons well prepard.

1 I.e., the noose and fetters Terpin is wearing. 2 repry’vd: reprieved. 3

gyv’d: shackled. dight: prepare. 5 The “goodly city” is sometimes read as an image of Elizabeth’s London. Spenser may 4

be echoing Christine de Pisan’s writings on the Amazon Penthesilea. See SE, “Christine de Pisan.” 6 harnesse: arms. 7 The 1609 edition has “arm’d like a man.” 8 rout: crowd. 9

grin: bare, grind.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

38

Soone as the gates were open to them set, They pressed forward, entraunce to have made. But in the middle way they were ymet With a sharpe showre of arrowes, which them staid, And better bad advise, ere they assaid1 Unknowen perill of bold womens pride. Then all that rout uppon them rudely laid, And heaped strokes so fast on every side, And arrowes haild so thicke, that they could not abide.

39

But Radigund her selfe, when she espide Sir Terpin, from her direfull doome acquit, So cruell doale amongst her maides divide,2 T’avenge that shame, they did on him commit, All sodainely enflam’d with furious fit, Like a fell Lionesse at him she flew, And on his head-peece him so fiercely smit, That to the ground him quite she overthrew, Dismayd so with the stroke, that he no colours knew.

40

Soone as she saw him on the ground to grovell, She lightly to him leapt, and in his necke Her proud foote setting, at his head did levell,3 Weening at once her wrath on him to wreake, And his contempt, that did her judg’ment breake. As when a Beare hath seiz’d her cruell clawes Uppon the carkasse of some beast too weake, Proudly stands over, and a while doth pause, To heare the piteous beast pleading her plaintiffe4 cause.

41

Whom when as Artegall in that distresse By chaunce beheld, he left the bloudy slaughter, In which he swam, and ranne to his redresse.5 There her assayling fiercely fresh, he raught her Such an huge stroke, that it of sence distraught6 her:

1

bad: bade; assaid: tested. doale: punishment, blows, grief; divide: distribute––picking up on the primary meaning of “dole” as a portion or a division of a whole. 2

3

levell: aim a blow. plaintiffe: plaintive and plaintiff in the judicial sense. 5 redresse: relief. 6 distraught: deranged. 4

Canto Four

57

And had she not it warded warily, It had depriv’d her mother of a daughter. Nathlesse for all the powre she did apply, It made her stagger oft, and stare with ghastly eye.1 42

Like to an Eagle in his kingly pride, Soring through his wide Empire of the aire, To weather his brode sailes,2 by chaunce hath spide A Goshauke,3 which hath seized for her share Uppon some fowle, that should her feast prepare; With dreadfull force he flies at her bylive,4 That with his souce,5 which none enduren dare, Her from the quarrey he away doth drive, And from her griping pounce6 the greedy prey doth rive.

43

But soone as she her sence recover’d had, She fiercely towards him her selfe gan dight,7 Through vengeful wrath and sdeignfull8 pride half mad: For never had she suffred such despight. But ere she could joyne hand with him to fight, Her warlike maides about her flockt so fast, That they disparted them, maugre9 their might, And with their troupes did far a sunder cast: But mongst the rest the fight did untill evening last.

44

And every while that mighty yron man, With his strange weapon, never wont in warre, Them sorely vext, and courst,10 and overran, And broke their bowes, and did their shooting marre, That none of all the many once did darre Him to assault, nor once approach him nie, But like a sort11 of sheepe dispersed farre For dread of their devouring enemie, Through all the fields and vallies did before him flie.

1

The four feminine rhymes in this stanza (lines 2, 4, 5, and 7) add an element of comedy to this scene of female power and violence, as Quilligan suggests (1987, 168). 2 weather: air out; sailes: wings. 3 Goshauke: a large, short-winged hawk. 4 bylive: suddenly.

5

souce: swoop. pounce: talons. 7 dight: direct. 8 sdeignfull: disdainful. 9 disparted: separated; maugre: despite. 10 courst: thrashed, hunted. 11 sort: flock. 6

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45

But when as daies faire shinie-beame, yclowded With fearefull shadowes of deformed night, Warn’d man and beast in quiet rest be shrowded, Bold Radigund with sound of trumpe on hight, Causd all her people to surcease from fight, And gathering them unto her citties gate, Made them all enter in before her sight, And all the wounded, and the weake in state,1 To be convayed in, ere she would once retrate.

46

When thus the field was voided all away, And all things quieted, the Elfin Knight Weary of toile and travell2 of that day, Causd his pavilion to be richly pight Before the city gate, in open sight; Where he him selfe did rest in safety, Together with sir Terpin all that night: But Talus usde in times of jeopardy To keepe a nightly watch, for dread of treachery.

47

But Radigund full of heart-gnawing griefe, For the rebuke,3 which she sustain’d that day, Could take no rest, ne would receive reliefe, But tossed in her troublous minde, what way She mote revenge that blot, which on her lay. There she resolv’d her selfe in single fight To try her Fortune, and his4 force assay, Rather then see her people spoiled quight, As she had seene that day a disaventerous5 sight.

48

She called forth to her a trusty mayd, Whom she thought fittest for that businesse, Her name was Clarin,6 and thus to her sayd; “Goe damzell quickly, doe thy selfe addresse, To doe7 the message, which I shall expresse.

1

state: condition. travell: travail. 3 rebuke: disgrace. 4 I.e., Artegall’s. 5 disaventerous: disastrous. 2

6 Short for Clarinda, suggesting in Latin “making known” and “loud.” In Tasso’s Gersusalemme Liberata, there is an Amazon named Clorinda (1.47). 7 doe: deliver.

Canto Four

Goe thou unto that stranger Faery Knight, Who yeester day drove us to such distresse, Tell, that to morrow I with him wil fight, And try in equall field, whether1 hath greater might. 49

“But these conditions doe to him propound, That if I vanquishe him, he shall obay My law, and ever to my lore be bound, And so will I, if me he vanquish may; What ever he shall like to doe or say.2 Goe streight, and take with thee, to witnesse it, Sixe of thy fellowes of the best array, And beare with you both wine and juncates3 fit, And bid him eate, henceforth he oft shall hungry sit.”

50

The Damzell streight obayd, and putting all In readinesse, forth to the Towne-gate went, Where sounding loud a Trumpet from the wall, Unto those warlike Knights she warning sent. Then Talus forth issuing from the tent, Unto the wall his way did fearelesse take, To weeten what that trumpets sounding ment: Where that same Damzell lowdly him bespake, And shew’d, that with his Lord she would emparlaunce4 make.

51

So he them streight conducted to his Lord, Who, as he could,5 them goodly well did greete, Till they had told their message word by word: Which he accepting well, as he could weete,6 Them fairely entertaynd with curt’sies meete, And gave them gifts and things of deare delight. So backe againe they homeward turnd their feete. But Artegall him selfe to rest did dight,7 That he mote fresher be against the next daies fight.

1

3

2

4

whether: which of us. According to Hamilton, this is a “heads-Iwin, tails-you-lose” proposition. Futhermore, if Artegall becomes bound to Radigund’s “lore,” he will be forsaking the “righteous lore” taught by Astraea (i.4.9).

juncates: delicacies. emparlaunce: parley. 5 I.e., as best he could. 6 I.e., as well as he knew how. 7 dight: prepare.

59

Canto Five Artegall fights with Radigund And is subdewd by guile: He is by her emprisoned, But wrought1 by Clarins wile.

1

So soone as day forth dawning from the East, Nights humid curtaine from the heavens withdrew, And earely calling forth both man and beast, Comaunded them their daily workes renew, These noble warriors, mindefull to pursew The last daies purpose2 of their vowed fight, Them selves thereto preparde in order dew; The Knight, as best was seeming for a Knight, And th’Amazon, as best it likt her selfe to dight.3

2

All in a Camis4 light of purple silke Woven uppon with silver, subtly wrought, And quilted uppon sattin white as milke, Trayled with ribbands diversly distraught5 Like as the workeman had their courses taught; Which was short tucked for light motion Up to her ham, but when she list, it raught6 Downe to her lowest heele, and thereuppon She wore for her defence a mayled habergeon.7

3

And on her legs she painted buskins8 wore, Basted9 with bends of gold on every side, And mailes betweene, and laced close afore:

1

5

2

6

wrought: worked over. purpose: resolution. 3 dight: equip. 4 Camis: a loose dress. The purple silk recalls Dido (Virgil, Aeneid, 4.139), as Hamilton points out.

distraught: drawn in different directions. raught: reached. 7 habergeon: armored coat. 8 buskins: boots. 9 Basted: stitched.

60

Canto Five

61

Uppon her thigh her Cemitare1 was tide, With an embrodered belt of mickell pride; And on her shoulder hung her shield, bedeckt Uppon the bosse with stones, that shined wide, As the faire Moone in her most full aspect, That to the Moone it mote be like in each respect.2 4

So forth she came out of the citty gate, With stately port and proud magnificence, Guarded with many damzels, that did waite Uppon her person for her sure defence, Playing on shaumes3 and trumpets, that from hence Their sound did reach unto the heavens hight. So forth into the field she marched thence, Where was a rich Pavilion ready pight, Her to receive, till time they should begin the fight.

5

Then forth came Artegall out of his tent, All arm’d to point, and first the Lists4 did enter: Soone after eke5 came she, with fell intent, And countenaunce fierce, as having fully bent her, That battels utmost triall to adventer.6 The Lists were closed fast, to barre the rout From rudely pressing to the middle center; Which in great heapes them circled all about, Wayting, how Fortune would resolve that daungerous dout.

6

The Trumpets sounded, and the field7 began; With bitter strokes it both began, and ended. She at the first encounter on him ran With furious rage, as if she had intended Out of his breast the very heart have rended: But he that had like tempests often tride,8

1

Cemitare: scimitar. Recalls the Amazon shields in Virgil (Aeneid, 1.490). This line may inspire Milton’s depiction of Satan’s shield (Paradise Lost, 1.286–91). 3 shaumes: instruments similar to oboes. 2

4

to point: completely; Lists: barriers enclosing the space for tilting. 5 eke: and. 6 adventer: venture. 7 field: battle. 8 tride: weathered.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

62

From that first flaw1 him selfe right well defended. The more she rag’d, the more he did abide; She hewd, she foynd, she lasht, she laid on every side. 7

Yet still her blowes he bore, and her forbore,2 Weening3 at last to win advantage new; Yet still her crueltie increased more, And though powre faild, her courage did accrew, Which4 fayling he gan fiercely her pursew. Like as a Smith that to his cunning feat5 The stubborne mettall seeketh to subdew, Soone as he feeles it mollifide6 with heat, With his great yron sledge doth strongly on it beat.

8

So did Sir Artegall upon her lay, As if she had an yron andvile beene, That flakes of fire, bright as the sunny ray, Out of her steely armes were flashing seene, That all on fire ye would her surely weene. But with her shield so well her selfe she warded, From the dread daunger of his weapon keene, That all that while her life she safely garded: But he that helpe from her against her will discarded.

9

For with his trenchant7 blade at the next blow Halfe of her shield he shared quite away, That halfe her side it selfe did naked show, And thenceforth unto daunger opened way. Much was she moved with the mightie sway Of that sad stroke, that halfe enrag’d she grew, And like a greedie Beare unto her pray, With her sharpe Cemitare at him she flew, That glauncing down his thigh,8 the purple bloud forth drew.

1

flaw: squall. forbore: spared. 3 weening: expecting. 4 I.e., her power. 2

5

feat: art. mollifide: softened. 7 trenchant: cutting. 8 In romance, sometimes standing for a nearby part. 6

Canto Five

10

Thereat she gan to triumph with great boast, And to upbrayd1 that chaunce, which him misfell, As if the prize she gotten had almost, With spightfull speaches, fitting with her well; That his great hart gan inwardly to swell With indignation, at her vaunting vaine, And at her strooke with puissance feareful fell; Yet with her shield she warded it againe, That2 shattered all to peeces round about the plaine.

11

Having her thus disarmed of her shield, Upon her helmet he againe her strooke, That downe she fell upon the grassie field, In sencelesse swoune, as if her life forsooke, And pangs of death her spirit overtooke. Whom when he saw before his foote prostrated, He to her lept with deadly dreadfull looke, And her sunshynie helmet soone unlaced, Thinking at once both head and helmet to have raced.3

12

But when as he discovered had her face, He saw his senses straunge astonishment, A miracle of natures goodly grace, In her faire visage voide of ornament, But bath’d in bloud and sweat together ment;4 Which in the rudenesse of that evill plight, Bewrayd5 the signes of feature excellent: Like as the Moone in foggie winters night, Doth seeme to be her selfe, though darkned be her light.

13

At sight thereof his cruell minded hart Empierced was with pittifull regard, That his sharpe sword he threw from him apart, Cursing his hand that had that visage mard: No hand so cruell, nor no hart so hard, But ruth of beautie will it mollifie.6

1

upbrayd: talk up. I.e., her shield. 3 raced: cut off, destroyed. 4 ment: mingled. 5 Bewrayd: revealed. 2

6

63

In a similar manner, Artegall quits fighting when Britomart’s face is revealed (IV.vi. 18–23). Achilles is similarly overwhelmed by the Amazon Penthesilea (Propertius, Elegies, 3.11.13–16). Also see Tasso, Gerusalemme Liberata, 3.21–28.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Five

By this upstarting from her swoune, she star’d A while about her with confused eye; Like one that from his dreame is waked suddenlye. 14

Soone as the knight she there by her did spy, Standing with emptie hands all weaponlesse, With fresh assault upon him she did fly, And gan renew her former cruelnesse: And though he still retyr’d,1 yet nathelesse With huge redoubled strokes she on him layd; And more increast her outrage mercilesse, The more that he with meeke intreatie prayd, Her wrathful hand from greedy vengeance to have stayd.

15

Like as a Puttocke2 having spyde in sight A gentle Faulcon sitting on an hill, Whose other wing, now made unmeete for flight, Was lately broken by some fortune ill; The foolish Kyte, led with licentious will, Doth beat upon the gentle bird in vaine, With many idle stoups3 her troubling still: Even so did Radigund with bootlesse paine Annoy this noble Knight, and sorely him constraine.

16

Nought could he do, but shun the dred despight Of her fierce wrath, and backward still retyre, And with his single shield,4 well as he might, Beare off the burden of her raging yre; And evermore he gently did desyre, To stay her stroks, and he himselfe would yield: Yet nould she hearke, ne let him once respyre,5 Till he to her delivered had his shield, And to her mercie him submitted in plaine field.

17

So was he overcome, not overcome, But to her yeelded of his owne accord; Yet was he justly damned by the doome

1

3

2

4

retyr’d: fell back. Puttocke: a bird of prey such as a kite. Often associated with ignobleness.

stoups: swoops. single shield: shield alone. 5 nould: would not; respyre: breathe.

Canto Five

65

Of his owne mouth, that spake so warelesse1 word, To be her thrall, and service2 her afford. For though that he first victorie obtayned, Yet after by abandoning his sword, He wilfull3 lost, that he before attayned. No fayrer4 conquest, then that with goodwill is gayned. 18

Tho5 with her sword on him she flatling strooke, In signe of true subjection to her powre,6 And as her vassall him to thraldome tooke. But Terpine borne to’a more unhappy howre, As he, on whom the lucklesse starres did lowre, She causd to be attacht,7 and forthwith led Unto the crooke t’abide the balefull stowre,8 From which he lately had through reskew fled: Where he full shamefully was hanged by the hed.

19

But when they thought on Talus hands to lay, He with his yron flaile amongst them thondred, That they were fayne9 to let him scape away, Glad from his companie to be so sondred; Whose presence all their troups so much encombred That th’heapes of those, which he did wound and slay, Besides the rest dismayd, might not be nombred: Yet all that while he would not once assay,10 To reskew his owne Lord, but thought it just t’obay.11

20

Then tooke the Amazon this noble knight, Left to her will by his owne wilfull blame, And caused him to be disarmed quight, Of all the ornaments12 of knightly name, With which whylome he gotten had great fame:

1

warelesse: unwary. Includes sexual favors, according to Hamilton. 3 wilfull: voluntarily. Also full of will, in the sense of sexual desire. 4 “Fair” can signify pure and complete. But it may ironically be read as beautiful or just. 5 Tho: then. 2

6

Touching him with the flat of her sword, Radigund dubs Artegall as her vassal. 7 attacht: arrested. 8 crooke: gallows; stowre: painful struggle, storm. 9 fayne: inclined. 10 assay: attempt. 11 Talus recognizes Artegall’s vow (iv.49). 12 ornaments: gear, equipment.

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In stead whereof she made him to be dight1 In womans weedes, that is to manhood shame, And put before his lap a napron2 white, In stead of Curiets and bases3 fit for fight. 21

So being clad, she brought him from the field, In which he had bene trayned many a day, Into a long large chamber, which was sield4 With moniments of many knights decay, By her subdewed in victorious fray: Amongst the which she causd his warlike armes Be hang’d on high, that mote his shame bewray;5 And broke his sword, for feare of further harmes, With which he wont to stirre up battailous alarmes.6

22

There entred in, he round about him saw Many brave knights, whose names right well he knew, There bound t’obay that Amazons proud law, Spinning and carding all in comely rew,7 That his bigge hart loth’d so uncomely vew. But they were forst through penurie and pyne,8 To doe those workes, to them appointed dew: For nought was given them to sup or dyne, But what their hands could earne by twisting linnen twyne.

23

Amongst them all she placed him most low, And in his hand a distaffe to him gave, That he thereon should spin both flax and tow;9 A sordid office for a mind so brave. So hard it is to be a womans slave. Yet he it tooke in his owne selfes despight, And thereto did himselfe right well behave, Her to obay, sith he his faith had plight,10 Her vassall to become, if she him wonne in fight.

1

dight: dressed. napron: apron. 3 Curiets and bases: body armor and mail. 4 sield: lined. 5 bewray: reveal. 2

6

The breaking of Artegall’s sword Chrysaor recalls Braggadocchio’s (iii.37). 7 rew: row. 8 penurie and pyne: lack of food and pining or suffering. 9 tow: the fibers of the flax. 10 plight: pledged.

Canto Five

24

Who had him seene, imagine mote thereby, That whylome hath of Hercules bene told, How for Iolas sake he did apply His mightie hands, the distaffe vile to hold, For his huge club, which had subdew’d of old So many monsters, which the world annoyed; His Lyons skin chaungd to a pall1 of gold, In which forgetting warres, he onely joyed In combats of sweet love, and with his mistresse toyed.2

25

Such is the crueltie of womenkynd, When they have shaken off the shamefast band, With which wise Nature did them strongly bynd, T’obay the heasts3 of mans well ruling hand, That then all rule and reason they withstand, To purchase a licentious libertie. But vertuous women wisely understand, That they were borne to base humilitie, Unlesse the heavens them lift to lawfull soveraintie.4

26

Thus there long while continu’d Artegall, Serving proud Radigund with true subjection; How ever it his noble heart did gall, T’obay a womans tyrannous direction, That might have had of life or death election:5 But having chosen, now he might not chaunge. During which time, the warlike Amazon, Whose wandring fancie after lust did raunge, Gan cast a secret liking to this captive straunge.

27

Which long concealing in her covert brest, She chaw’d the cud of lovers carefull plight;6 Yet could it not so thoroughly digest, Being fast fixed in her wounded spright,7

1

3

2

4

pall: robe. Hercules was enslaved and forced to spin with a distaff by Omphale, here conflated or confused with his last lover, Iole. See Ovid, Heroides, 9.59–118. Hercules spinning was a common Renaissance emblem for the emasculating power of female sexuality and licentious male desire. See Aptekar, 171–200.

67

heasts: commands, behests. Spenser makes an exception in the alexandrine for Elizabeth. 5 I.e., Artegall might have chosen to die instead, as did Terpine (iv.32). 6 This image returns in vi.19. 7 spright: spirit.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

68

But it tormented her both day and night: Yet would she not thereto yeeld free accord, To serve the lowly vassall of her might, And of her servant make her soverayne Lord: So great her pride, that she such basenesse much abhord. 28

So much the greater still her anguish grew, Through stubborne handling of her love-sicke hart; And still the more she strove it to subdew, The more she still augmented her owne smart, And wyder made the wound of th’hidden dart. At last when long she struggled had in vaine, She gan to stoupe,1 and her proud mind convert To meeke obeysance2 of loves mightie raine, And him entreat for grace, that had procur’d her paine.

29

Unto her selfe in secret she did call Her nearest handmayd, whom she most did trust, And to her said; “Clarinda whom of all I trust a live, sith I thee fostred3 first; Now is the time, that I untimely must Thereof make tryall,4 in my greatest need: It is so hapned, that the heavens unjust, Spighting my happie freedome, have agreed, To thrall my looser life, or my last bale5 to breed.”

30

With that she turn’d her head, as halfe abashed, To hide the blush which in her visage rose, And through her eyes like sudden lightning flashed, Decking her cheeke with a vermilion rose: But soone she did her countenance compose, And to her turning, thus began againe; “This griefes deepe wound I would to thee disclose, Thereto compelled through hart-murdring paine, But dread of shame my doubtfull lips doth still restraine.”

1

4

2

5

stoupe: bow, submit. obeysance: obedience. 3 fostred: brought up.

I.e., make trial of that trust. thrall: enslave; bale: torment, death.

Canto Five

31

“Ah my deare dread”1 (said then the faithfull Mayd) “Can dread of ought your dreadlesse hart withhold, That many hath with dread of death dismayd, And dare even deathes most dreadfull face behold? Say on my soverayne Ladie, and be bold; Doth not your handmayds life at your foot lie?” Therewith much comforted, she gan unfold The cause of her conceived maladie, As one that would confesse, yet faine2 would it denie.

32

“Clarin” (sayd she) “thou seest yond Fayry Knight, Whom not my valour, but his owne brave mind Subjected hath to my unequall3 might; What right is it, that he should thraldome find, For lending life to me a wretch unkind; That for such good him recompence with ill? Therefore I cast,4 how I may him unbind, And by his freedome get his free goodwill; Yet so, as bound to me he may continue still.

33

“Bound unto me, but not with such hard bands Of strong compulsion, and streight violence, As now in miserable state he stands; But with sweet love and sure benevolence, Voide of malitious mind, or foule offence. To which if thou canst win him any way, Without discoverie of my thoughts pretence,5 Both goodly meede6 of him it purchase may, And eke with gratefull service me right well apay.

34

“Which that thou mayst the better bring to pas, Loe here this ring, which shall thy warrant bee, And token true to old Eumenias,7 From time to time, when thou it best shalt see, That in and out thou mayst have passage free. Goe now, Clarinda, well thy wits advise,

1

Clarinda puns on the many uses of dread, meaning extreme fear. Here it is an address to one held in reverence. 2 faine: rather. 3 unequall: unjust.

4

69

cast: consider. pretence: purpose. 6 meede: reward. 7 Artegall’s jailor, meaning “goodwill” in Greek. 5

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And all thy forces gather unto thee; Armies of lovely lookes, and speeches wise, With which thou canst even Jove himselfe to love entise.” 35

The trustie Mayd, conceiving her intent, Did with sure promise of her good indevour, Give her great comfort, and some harts content. So from her parting, she thenceforth did labour By all the meanes she might, to curry favour With th’Elfin Knight, her Ladies best beloved; With daily shew of courteous kind behaviour, Even at the markewhite of his hart she roved,1 And with wide glauncing words, one day she thus him proved.2

36

“Unhappie Knight, upon whose hopelesse state Fortune envying good, hath felly3 frowned, And cruell heavens have heapt an heavy fate; I rew that thus thy better dayes are drowned In sad despaire, and all thy senses swowned In stupid sorow, sith thy juster merit Might else have with felicitie bene crowned: Looke up at last, and wake thy dulled spirit, To thinke how this long death thou mightest disinherit.”

37

Much did he marvell at her uncouth4 speach, Whose hidden drift he could not well perceive; And gan to doubt, least she him sought t’appeach5 Of treason, or some guilefull traine6 did weave, Through which she might his wretched life bereave. Both which to barre, he with this answere met her; “Faire Damzell, that with ruth (as I perceave) Of my mishaps, art mov’d to wish me better, For such your kind regard, I can but rest your detter.

1

An extended archery metaphor: “markewhite” is the white bull’s-eye; to “rove” is to shoot with a scattered aim intended to zero in on the mark; “glauncing” suggests words that either miss the target or, as in Hamilton, are indirect.

2

proved: tested. felly: fiercely. 4 uncouth: awkward, obscure. 5 t’appeach: to accuse. 6 traine: trick. 3

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38

“Yet weet ye well, that to a courage great It is no lesse beseeming well, to beare The storme of fortunes frowne, or heavens threat, Then in the sunshine of her countenance cleare Timely to joy, and carrie comely cheare. For though this cloud have now me overcast, Yet doe I not of better times despeyre; And, though unlike,1 they should for ever last, Yet in my truthes assurance I rest fixed fast.”

39

“But what so stonie mind” (she then replyde) “But if in his owne powre occasion lay, Would to his hope a windowe open wyde, And to his fortunes helpe make readie way?”2 “Unworthy sure” (quoth he) “of better day, That will not take the offer of good hope, And eke pursew, if he attaine it may.” Which speaches she applying to the scope3 Of her intent, this further purpose to him shope.4

40

“Then why doest not, thou ill advized man, Make meanes to win thy libertie forlorne,5 And try if thou by faire entreatie, can Move Radigund? who though she still have worne Her dayes in warre, yet (weet thou) was not borne Of Beares and Tygres, nor so salvage mynded, As that, albe6 all love of men she scorne, She yet forgets, that she of men was kynded:7 And sooth oft seene, that proudest harts base8 love hath blynded.”

41

“Certes Clarinda, not of cancred9 will,” (Sayd he) “nor obstinate disdainefull mind, I have forbore this duetie to fulfill: For well I may this weene, by that I fynd, That she a Queene, and come of Princely kynd,

1

5

2

6

unlike: unlikely. I.e., what mind would not seize the occasion? 3 scope: goal. 4 shope: shaped, framed.

forlorne: lost. albe: although. 7 kynded: begotten. 8 base: humble. 9 cancred: diseased.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

72

Both worthie is for to be sewd1 unto, Chiefely by him, whose life her law doth bynd, And eke of powre her owne doome to undo, And als’ of princely grace to be inclyn’d thereto. 42

“But want of meanes hath bene mine onely let,2 From seeking favour, where it doth abound; Which if I might by your good office get, I to your selfe should rest for ever bound, And readie to deserve, what grace I found.” She feeling him thus bite upon the bayt, Yet doubting least his hold was but unsound, And not well fastened, would not strike him strayt, But drew him on with hope, fit leasure to awayt.

43

But foolish Mayd, whyles heedlesse of the hooke, She thus oft times was beating off and on, Through slipperie footing, fell into the brooke, And there was caught to her confusion. For seeking thus to salve3 the Amazon, She wounded was with her deceipts owne dart, And gan thenceforth to cast affection, Conceived close in her beguiled hart, To Artegall, through pittie4 of his causeless smart.

44

Yet durst she not disclose her fancies wound, Ne to himselfe, for doubt of being sdayned,5 Ne yet to any other wight on ground,6 For feare her mistresse shold have knowledge gayned, But to her selfe it secretly retayned, Within the closet of her covert brest: The more thereby her tender hart was payned. Yet to awayt fit time she weened best, And fairely did dissemble her sad thoughts unrest.

45

One day her Ladie, calling her apart, Gan to demaund of her some tydings good, Touching her loves successe, her lingring smart.

1

4

2

5

sewd: courted. let: hindrance. 3 salve: heal.

Echoing Artegall, v.13. sdayned: disdained. 6 on ground: on earth.

Canto Five

Therewith she gan at first to change her mood, As one adaw’d,1 and halfe confused stood; But quickly she it overpast, so soone As she her face had wypt, to fresh her blood: Tho gan she tell her all, that she had donne, And all the wayes she sought, his love for to have wonne. 46

But sayd, that he was obstinate and sterne, Scorning her offers and conditions vaine; Ne would be taught with any termes, to lerne So fond a lesson, as to love againe.2 Die rather would he in penurious paine, And his abridged dayes in dolour wast, Then his foes love or liking entertaine: His resolution was both first and last, His bodie was her thrall, his hart was freely plast.

47

Which when the cruell Amazon perceived, She gan to storme, and rage, and rend her gall,3 For very fell despight, which she conceived, To be so scorned of a base borne thrall, Whose life did lie in her least eye-lids fall; Of which4 she vow’d with many a cursed threat, That she therefore would him ere long forstall. Nathlesse when calmed was her furious heat, he chang’d that threatfull mood, and mildly gan entreat.

48

“What now is left Clarinda? what remaines, That we may compasse5 this our enterprize? Great shame to lose so long employed paines, And greater shame t’abide so great misprize,6 With which he dares our offers thus despize. Yet that his guilt the greater may appeare, And more my gratious mercie by this wize, I will a while with his first folly beare, Till thou have tride againe, and tempted him more neare.

1

4

2

5

adaw’d: daunted. againe: in return. 3 The gall bladder was considered the seat of anger––Radigund seems about to rupture it in a fit of rage.

I.e., his life. compasse: accomplish. 6 misprize: scorn.

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49

“Say, and do all, that may thereto prevaile; Leave nought unpromist, that may him perswade, Life, freedome, grace, and gifts of great availe,1 With which the Gods themselves are mylder made: Thereto adde art, even womens witty trade, The art of mightie words, that men can charme; With which in case thou canst him not invade, Let him feele hardnesse of thy heavie arme: Who will not stoupe with good, shall be made stoupe with harme.

50

“Some of his diet doe from him withdraw; For I him find to be too proudly fed. Give him more labour, and with streighter2 law, That he with worke may be forwearied.3 Let him lodge hard, and lie in strawen bed, That may pull downe the courage of his pride; And lay upon him, for his greater dread, Cold yron chaines, with which let him be tide; And let, what ever he desires, be him denide.

51

“When thou hast all this doen, then bring me newes Of his demeane:4 thenceforth not like a lover, But like a rebell stout I will him use. For I resolve this siege not to give over, Till I the conquest of my will recover.” So she departed, full of griefe and sdaine,5 Which inly did to great impatience move her. But the false mayden6 shortly turn’d againe Unto the prison, where her hart did thrall remaine.

52

There all her subtill nets she did unfold, And all the engins7 of her wit display; In which she meant him warelesse to enfold, And of his innocence to make her pray. So cunningly she wrought her crafts assay,

1

availe: value. streighter: stricter. 3 forwearied: exhausted. 4 demeane: demeanor––meaning behav2

ior, but retaining the related senses of “to rule” and “to treat badly.” 5 sdaine: disdaine. 6 I.e., Clarinda. 7 engins: snares.

Canto Five

75

That both her Ladie, and her selfe withall, And eke the knight attonce she did betray: But most the knight, whom she with guilefull call1 Did cast2 for to allure, into her trap to fall. 53

As a bad Nurse, which fayning to receive In her owne mouth the food, ment for her chyld, Withholdes it to her selfe, and doeth deceive The infant, so for want of nourture spoyld: Even so Clarinda her owne Dame beguyld, And turn’d the trust, which was in her affyde,3 To feeding of her private fire, which boyld Her inward brest, and in her entrayles fryde, The more that she it sought to cover and to hyde.

54

For comming to this knight, she purpose fayned,4 How earnest suit she earst for him had made Unto her Queene, his freedome to have gayned; But by no meanes could her thereto perswade: But that in stead thereof, she sternely bade His miserie to be augmented more, And many yron bands on him to lade.5 All which nathlesse she for his love forbore: So praying him t’accept her service evermore.

55

And more then that, she promist that she would, In case she might finde favour in his eye, Devize how to enlarge him out of hould. The Fayrie6 glad to gaine his libertie, Can7 yeeld great thankes for such her curtesie, And with faire words, fit for the time and place,

1

A metaphor from the use of bird calls in hunting. 2 cast: contrive. Also picks up on the image of the nets. 3 affyde: confided.

4

purpose fayned: feigned a discourse, made up a tale. 5 lade: load. 6 Spenser calls Artegall a fairy, although he is a human changeling (III.iii.26). 7 can: did.

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To feede the humour of her maladie; Promist, if she would free him from that case,1 He wold by all good means he might, deserve such grace. 56

So daily he faire semblant2 did her shew, Yet never meant he in his noble mind, To his owne absent love to be untrew: Ne ever did deceiptfull Clarin find In her false hart, his bondage to unbind; But rather how she mote him faster tye. Therefore unto her mistresse most unkind She daily told, her love he did defye, And him she told, her Dame his freedome did denye.

57

Yet thus much friendship she to him did show, That his scarse diet somewhat was amended, And his worke lessened, that his love mote grow: Yet to her Dame him still she discommended,3 That she with him mote be the more offended. Thus he long while in thraldome there remayned, Of both beloved well, but litle frended; Untill his owne true love his freedome gayned, Which in an other Canto will be best contayned.

1 The repetition of “case” in this stanza may suggest that Artegall is engaging in a kind of casuistry, or equivocation, when he makes his promise to Clarinda.

2 3

semblant: appearance. discommended: found fault with.

Canto Six Talus brings newes to Britomart, of Artegals mishap, She goes to seeke him, Dolon meetes, who seekes her to entrap.

1

Some men, I wote, will deeme in Artegall Great weaknesse, and report of him much ill, For yeelding so himselfe a wretched thrall, To th’insolent commaund of womens will; That all his former praise doth fowly spill.1 But he the man, that say or doe so dare, Be well adviz’d, that he stand stedfast still: For never yet was wight so well aware, But he at first or last was trapt in womens snare.2

2

Yet in the streightnesse3 of that captive state, This gentle knight himselfe so well behaved, That notwithstanding all the subtill bait, With which those Amazons his love still craved, To his owne love his loialtie he saved: Whose character4 in th’Adamantine mould Of his true hart so firmely was engraved, That no new loves impression ever could Bereave5 it thence: such blot his honour blemish should.

3

Yet his owne love, the noble Britomart,6 Scarse so conceived in her jealous thought,

1

6

spill: spoil. Spenser adds a misogynistic sentiment to 1 Cor. 10.12. 3 streightnesse: strictness. 4 character: an engraved mark, also carrying the sense of distinguishing traits. 5 Bereave: rob, strip.

The hero of Book Three, a figure for Chastity, and a dominating female warrior. See Introduction, 6. Just after vowing to marry Britomart, Artegall departed on his quest, promising to return within three months (IV.vi.43). Britomart resembles Ariosto’s Bradimante. For this episode, see Orlando, 30–32.

2

77

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What time1 sad tydings of his balefull smart In womans bondage, Talus to her brought; Brought in untimely houre, ere it was sought. For after that the utmost date, assynde For his returne, she waited had for nought, She gan to cast in her misdoubtfull mynde A thousand feares, that love-sick fancies faine to fynde.2 4

Sometime she feared, least some hard mishap Had him misfalne in his adventurous quest; Sometime least his false foe did him entrap In traytrous traine, or had unwares opprest:3 But most she did her troubled mynd molest, And secretly afflict with jealous feare, Least some new love had him from her possest; Yet loth she was, since she no ill did heare, To thinke of him so ill: yet could she not forbeare.

5

One while she blam’d her selfe; another whyle She him condemn’d, as trustlesse and untrew: And then, her griefe with errour to beguyle, She fayn’d4 to count the time againe anew, As if before she had not counted trew. For houres but dayes; for weekes, that passed were, She told but moneths, to make them seeme more few:5 Yet when she reckned them, still drawing neare, Each hour did seeme a moneth, and every moneth a yeare.

6

But when as yet she saw him not returne, She thought to send some one to seeke him out; But none she found so fit to serve that turne, As her owne selfe, to ease her selfe of dout. Now she deviz’d amongst the warlike rout Of errant Knights, to seeke her errant6 Knight;

1

What time: when. faine to fynde: are quick to find. 3 traine: trap; opprest: overcome. 4 fayn’d: wished. 5 I.e., she counts the passed time in days and 2

months rather than hours and weeks, since three months sounds like less time than twelve weeks. But when reckoning time to come, each hour seems a month, etc. 6 errant: traveling and erring––a play on the quintessentially Spenserian word.

Canto Six

79

And then againe resolv’d to hunt him out Amongst loose Ladies, lapped1 in delight: And then both Knights envide, and Ladies eke did spight.2 7

One day, when as she long had sought for ease In every place, and every place thought best, Yet found no place, that could her liking please, She to a window came, that opened West, Towards which coast3 her love his way addrest. There looking forth, shee in her heart did find Many vaine fancies, working her unrest; And sent her winged thoughts, more swift then wind, To beare unto her love the message of her mind.

8

There as she looked long, at last she spide One comming towards her with hasty speede: Well weend she then, ere him she plaine descride, That it was one sent from her love indeede. Who when he nigh approcht, shee mote arede4 That it was Talus, Artegall his groome; Whereat her heart was fild with hope and drede; Ne would she stay, till he in place could come, But ran to meete him forth, to know his tidings somme.5

9

Even in the dore him meeting, she begun; “And where is he thy Lord, and how far hence? Declare at once; and hath he lost or wun?” The yron man, albe6 he wanted sence And sorrowes feeling, yet with conscience7 Of his ill newes, did inly chill and quake, And stood still mute, as one in great suspence, As if that by his silence he would make Her rather reade his meaning, then him selfe it spake.

1

lapped: surrounded––but with the ladies’ laps embedded in the word, as Hamilton points out. 2 I.e., Britomart assumes the worst about Artegall and all knights and ladies. 3 coast: region. Ireland lies to the west of England. 4 arede: recognize.

5

his tidings somme: the sum of his news. albe: although. 7 conscience: awareness. In Spenser’s period, the word simultaneously meant consciousness and conscience. The second meaning may be reinforced here by the suggestion of an inner life in Talus. 6

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10

Till she again thus sayd; “Talus be bold, And tell what ever it be, good or bad, That from thy tongue thy hearts intent doth hold.” To whom he thus at length. “The tidings sad, That I would hide, will needs, I see, be rad.1 My Lord, your love, by hard mishap doth lie In wretched bondage, wofully bestad.”2 “Ay me” (quoth she) “what wicked destinie? And is he vanquisht by his tyrant enemy?”

11

“Not by that Tyrant, his intended foe; But by a Tyrannesse” (he then replide,) “That him captived hath in haplesse woe.” “Cease thou bad newes-man, badly doest thou hide Thy maisters shame, in harlots bondage tide. The rest my selfe too readily can spell.”3 With that in rage she turn’d from him aside, Forcing4 in vaine the rest to her to tell, And to her chamber went like solitary cell.

12

There she began to make her monefull plaint5 Against her Knight, for being so untrew; And him to touch with falshoods fowle attaint, That all his other honour overthrew. Oft did she blame her selfe, and often rew, For yeelding to a straungers love so light, Whose life and manners straunge she never knew; And evermore she did him sharpely twight6 For breach of faith to her, which he had firmely plight.

13

And then she in her wrathfull will did cast, How to revenge that blot of honour blent;7 To fight with him, and goodly die her last: And then againe she did her selfe torment, Inflicting on her selfe his punishment. A while she walkt, and chauft;8 a while she threw

1

4

2

5

rad: discovered. wofully bestad: troubled. This dialogue is Talus’ first speech. He begins haltingly, as if the iron jaw needs oiling. 3 spell: infer.

Forcing: striving. plaint: complaint. 6 twight: blame. 7 blent: blemished. 8 chauft: chafed.

Canto Six

Her selfe uppon her bed, and did lament: Yet did she not lament with loude alew,1 As women wont, but with deepe sighes, and singulfs2 few. 14

Like as a wayward childe, whose sounder sleepe Is broken with some fearefull dreames affright, With froward will doth set him selfe to weepe; Ne can be stild for all his nurses might, But kicks, and squals, and shriekes for fell despight: Now scratching her, and her loose locks misusing; Now seeking darkenesse, and now seeking light; Then craving sucke, and then the sucke refusing. Such was this Ladies fit, in her loves fond3 accusing.

15

But when she had with such unquiet fits Her selfe there close afflicted long in vaine, Yet found no easement in her troubled wits, She unto Talus forth return’d againe, By change of place seeking to ease her paine; And gan enquire of him, with mylder mood, The certaine cause of Artegals detaine; And what he did, and in what state he stood, And whether he did woo, or whether he were woo’d.

16

“Ah wellaway” (sayd then the yron man,) “That he is not the while in state4 to woo; But lies in wretched thraldome, weake and wan, Not by strong hand compelled thereunto, But his owne doome, that none can now undoo.” “Sayd I not then” (quoth shee) “erwhile5 aright, That this is things compacte betwixt you two, Me to deceive of faith unto me plight, Since that he was not forst, nor overcome in fight?”

17

With that he gan at large to her dilate6 The whole discourse of his captivance7 sad, In sort as ye have heard the same of late.

1

5

2

6

alew: halloo––i.e., she did not wail. singulfs: sobs. 3 fond: foolish. 4 state: condition.

erwhile: earlier. dilate: expand, relate. 7 captivance: captivity.

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All which when she with hard enduraunce had Heard to the end, she was right sore bestad,1 With sodaine stounds of wrath and griefe attone:2 Ne would abide, till she had aunswere made, But streight her selfe did dight,3 and armor don; And mounting to her steede, bad Talus guide her on. 18

So forth she rode uppon her ready way, To seeke her Knight, as Talus her did guide: Sadly she rode, and never word did say, Nor good nor bad, ne ever lookt aside, But still right downe, and in her thought did hide The felnesse4 of her heart, right fully bent To fierce avengement of that womans pride, Which had her Lord in her base prison pent, And so great honour with so fowle reproch had blent.5

19

So as she thus melancholicke did ride, Chawing the cud of griefe and inward paine,6 She chaunst to meete toward th’even-tide A Knight, that softly paced on the plaine, As if him selfe to solace he were faine.7 Well shot8 in yeares he seem’d, and rather bent To peace, then needlesse trouble to constraine. As well by view of that his vestiment,9 As by his modest semblant,10 that no evill ment.

20

He comming neare, gan gently her salute With curteous words, in the most comely wize; Who though desirous rather to rest mute, Then termes to entertaine of common guize,11 Yet rather then she kindnesse would despize, She would her selfe displease, so him requite.12

1

8

2

9

bestad: beset. stounds: pangs; attone: at once. 3 dight: dress. 4 felnesse: fierceness, cruelty. 5 blent: blemished. 6 See v.27. 7 faine: desirous.

shot: advanced. vestiment: clothing. 10 semblant: demeanor. 11 I.e., small talk, to which the knight is inclined. 12 requite: return his courtesy.

Canto Six

Then gan the other further to devize Of things abrode, as next to hand did light, And many things demaund, to which she answer’d light.1 21

For little lust2 had she to talke of ought, Or ought to heare, that mote delightfull bee; Her minde was whole possessed of one thought, That gave none other place. Which when as hee By outward signes, (as well he might) did see, He list no lenger to use lothfull speach, But her besought to take it well in gree,3 Sith shady dampe had dimd the heavens reach, To lodge with him that night, unles good cause empeach.4

22

The Championesse, now seeing night at dore, Was glad to yeeld unto his good request: And with him went without gaine-saying more. Not farre away, but little wide by West, His dwelling was, to which he him addrest;5 Where soone arriving they received were In seemely wise, as them beseemed best: For he their host them goodly well did cheare, And talk’t of pleasant things, the night away to weare.

23

Thus passing th’evening well, till time of rest, Then Britomart unto a bowre6 was brought; Where groomes awayted her to have undrest. But she ne would undressed be for ought, Ne doffe her armes, though he her much besought. For she had vow’d, she sayd, not to forgo Those warlike weedes, till she revenge had wrought Of a late wrong uppon a mortall foe; Which she would sure performe, betide her wele or wo.

24

Which when their Host perceiv’d, right discontent In minde he grew, for feare least by that art7 He should his purpose misse, which close8 he ment:

1

5

2

6

light: sparingly. lust: desire. 3 well in gree: with goodwill. 4 empeach: argues against.

him addrest: directed himself. bowre: bedroom. 7 art: means. 8 close: secretly.

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Yet taking leave of her, he did depart. There all that night remained Britomart, Restlesse, recomfortlesse, with heart deepe grieved, Not suffering the least twinckling sleepe to start Into her eye, which th’heart mote have relieved, But if the least appear’d, her eyes she streight reprieved.1 25

“Ye guilty eyes” (sayd she) “the which with guyle My heart at first betrayd,2 will ye betray My life now to, for which3 a little whyle Ye will not watch? false watches, wellaway, I wote when ye did watch both night and day Unto your losse: and now needes will ye sleepe? Now ye have made my heart to wake alway, Now will ye sleepe?4 ah wake, and rather weepe, To thinke of your nights want, that should yee waking keepe.”

26

Thus did she watch, and weare the weary night In waylfull plaints, that none was to appease; Now walking soft, now sitting still upright, As sundry5 chaunge her seemed best to ease. Ne lesse did Talus suffer sleepe to seaze His eye-lids sad, but watcht continually, Lying without her dore in great disease;6 Like to a Spaniell wayting carefully Least any should betray his Lady treacherously.

27

What time the native Belman of the night, The bird, that warned Peter of his fall,7 First rings his silver Bell t’each sleepy wight, That should their mindes up to devotion call, She heard a wondrous noise below the hall. All sodainely the bed, where she should lie,

1

reprieved: reproved. Britomart fell in love with Artegall on seeing his image in a magic mirror (III.ii.24). 3 for which: because. 2

4

Britomart’s three questions recall Matt. 26.40–44, as Hamilton points out. 5 sundry: varying. 6 disease: uneasiness. 7 The cock. See Matt. 26.34, 74–75; Mark 14.30, 68–72.

Canto Six

By a false trap was let adowne to fall Into a lower roome, and by and by The loft1 was raysd againe, that no man could it spie. 28

With sight whereof she was dismayd right sore, Perceiving well the treason, which was ment: Yet stirred not at all for doubt of more, But kept her place with courage confident, Wayting what would ensue of that event. It was not long, before she heard the sound Of armed men, comming with close intent Towards her chamber; at which dreadfull stound2 She quickly caught her sword, and shield about her bound.

29

With that there came unto her chamber dore Two Knights, all arm’d ready for to fight, And after them full many other more, A raskall rout, with weapons rudely dight.3 Whom soone as Talus spide by glims4 of night, He started up, there where on ground he lay, And in his hand his thresher ready keight.5 They seeing that, let drive at him streight way, And round about him preace6 in riotous aray.

30

But soone as he began to lay about With his rude yron flaile, they gan to flie, Both armed Knights, and eke unarmed rout: Yet Talus after them apace did plie,7 Where ever in the darke he could them spie; That here and there like scattred sheepe they lay. Then backe returning, where his Dame did lie, He to her told the story of that fray, And all that treason there intended did bewray.

31

Wherewith though wondrous wroth, and inly burning, To be avenged for so fowle a deede, Yet being forst to abide the daies returning,

1

5

2

6

loft: floor. stound: decisive moment. 3 dight: equipped. 4 glims: glimpse.

keight: caught. preace: press. 7 plie: run, attack.

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She there remain’d, but with right wary heede, Least any more such practise1 should proceede. Now mote ye know (that which to Britomart Unknowen was) whence all this did proceede, And for what cause so great mischievous smart2 Was ment to her, that never evill ment in hart. 32

The goodman of this house was Dolon3 hight, A man of subtill wit and wicked minde, That whilome in his youth had bene a Knight, And armes had borne, but little good could finde, And much lesse honour by that warlike kinde Of life: for he was nothing valorous, But with slie shiftes and wiles did underminde All noble Knights, which were adventurous, And many brought to shame by treason treacherous.

33

He had three sonnes, all three like fathers sonnes, Like treacherous, like full of fraud and guile, Of all that on this earthly compasse wonnes:4 The eldest of the which was slaine erewhile By Artegall, through his owne guilty wile;5 His name was Guizor,6 whose untimely fate For to avenge, full many treasons vile His father Dolon had deviz’d of late With these his wicked sons, and shewd his cankred hate.

34

For sure he weend, that this his present guest Was Artegall, by many tokens plaine; But chiefly by that yron page he ghest, Which still was wont with Artegall remaine; And therefore ment him surely to have slaine. But by Gods grace, and her good heedinesse,7

1

practise: plotting. smart: injury. 3 In English, suggests dole: guile as well as sorrow. Also the name of the bumbling Trojan spy (Homer, Iliad, 10.313–481). This episode is often read as alluding to the numerous attempts on Elizabeth’s life (Variorum, 211–12). 2

4

I.e., they are the most fraudulent, etc., of all that live on earth. 5 wile: trick. 6 For Artegall’s killing of Pollente’s “groome of evill guize,” see ii.6–11. 7 heedinesse: heedfulness.

Canto Six

87

She was preserved from their traytrous traine. Thus she all night wore out in watchfulnesse, Ne suffred slothfull sleepe her eyelids to oppresse. 35

The morrow next, so soone as dawning houre Discovered had the light to living eye, She forth yssew’d out of her loathed bowre, With full intent t’avenge that villany, On that vilde man, and all his family. And comming down to seeke them, where they wond,1 Nor sire, nor sonnes, nor any could she spie: Each rowme she sought, but them all empty fond: They all were fled for feare, but whether, nether kond.2

36

She saw it vaine to make there lenger stay, But tooke her steede, and thereon mounting light, Gan her addresse unto her former way. She had not rid the mountenance of a flight,3 But that she saw there present in her sight, Those two false brethren, on that perillous Bridge, On which Pollente with Artegall did fight. Streight was the passage like a ploughed ridge, That if two met, the one mote needes fall over the lidge.4

37

There they did thinke them selves on her to wreake: Who as she nigh unto them drew, the one These vile reproches gan unto her speake; “Thou recreant false traytor, that with lone Of armes hast knighthood stolne, yet Knight art none, No more shall now the darkenesse of the night Defend thee from the vengeance of thy fone,5 But with thy bloud thou shalt appease the spright Of Guizor, by thee slaine, and murdred by thy slight.”

38

Strange were the words in Britomartis eare; Yet stayd she not for them, but forward fared, Till to the perillous Bridge she came, and there

1

wond: lived. whether, nether kond: whither, neither knew.

2

3 mountenance of a flight: extent of an arrow’s flight. 4 lidge: ledge. 5

fone: foes.

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Talus desir’d, that he might have prepared The way to her, and those two losels1 scared. But she thereat was wroth, that for despight The glauncing sparkles through her bever2 glared, And from her eies did flash out fiery light, Like coles, that through a silver Censer3 sparkle bright. 39

She stayd not to advise which way to take; But putting spurres unto her fiery beast, Thorough the midst of them she way did make. The one of them, which most her wrath increast, Uppon her speare she bore before her breast, Till to the Bridges further end she past, Where falling downe, his challenge he releast:4 The other over side the Bridge she cast Into the river, where he drunke his deadly last.5

40

As when the flashing Levin6 haps to light Uppon two stubborne oakes, which stand so neare, That way betwixt them none appeares in sight; The Engin7 fiercely flying forth, doth teare Th’one from the earth, and through the aire doth beare; The other it with force doth overthrow, Uppon one side, and from his rootes doth reare. So did the Championesse those two there strow,8 And to their sire their carcasses left to bestow.

1

5

2

6

losels: scoundrels. bever: face guard. 3 Censer: vessel for burning incense. 4 I.e., he withdrew his challenge.

See Orlando, 35.38–48. Levin: lightning. 7 Engin: the lightning. 8 strow: strew.

Canto Seven Britomart comes to Isis Church, Where shee strange visions sees: She fights with Radigund, her slaies, And Artegall thence frees.

1

Nought is on earth more sacred or divine, That Gods and men doe equally adore, Then this same vertue, that doth right define: For th’hevens themselves, whence mortal men implore Right in their wrongs, are rul’d by righteous lore Of highest Jove, who doth true justice deale To his inferiour Gods, and evermore Therewith containes his heavenly Common-weale:1 The skill whereof to Princes hearts he doth reveale.

2

Well therefore did the antique world invent, That Justice was a God of soveraine grace, And altars unto him, and temples lent, And heavenly honours in the highest place; Calling him great Osyris, of the race Of th’old Aegyptian Kings, that whylome were; With fayned colours shading2 a true case: For that Osyris, whilest he lived here, The justest man alive, and truest did appeare.3

3

His wife was Isis, whom they likewise made A Goddesse of great powre and soverainty, And in her person cunningly did shade

1

3

I.e., Jove contains, or governs, his commonwealth with true justice. Cf. Proem, 10. 2 shading: representing or symbolizing–– suggesting the poet’s task in shadowing forth allegory, or what Spenser calls “darke conceit” (“Letter to Raleigh”).

The human King Osiris and Queen Isis were deified for their virtues, becoming important Egyptian gods of justice. Much of the detail of this episode comes from Plutarch, Isis and Osiris; and Diodorus, Bibliotheca Historica, 1.11–25. For the distinction between justice and equity, see Introduction, 2.

89

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That part of Justice, which is Equity, Whereof I have to treat here presently. Unto whose temple when as Britomart Arrived, shee with great humility Did enter in, ne would that night depart; But Talus mote not be admitted to her part.1 4

There she received was in goodly wize Of many Priests, which duely did attend Uppon the rites and daily sacrifize, All clad in linnen robes with silver hemd; And on their heads with long locks comely kemd,2 They wore rich Mitres shaped like the Moone, To shew that Isis doth the Moone portend;3 Like as Osyris signifies the Sunne. For that they both like race in equall justice runne.4

5

The Championesse them greeting, as she could, Was thence by them into the Temple led; Whose goodly building when she did behould, Borne uppon stately pillours, all dispred5 With shining gold, and arched over hed, She wondred at the workemans passing skill, Whose like before she never saw nor red;6 And thereuppon long while stood gazing still, But thought, that she thereon could never gaze her fill.

6

Thence forth unto the Idoll they her brought, The which was framed all of silver fine, So well as could with cunning hand be wrought, And clothed all in garments made of line,7 Hemd all about with fringe of silver twine. Uppon her head she wore a Crowne of gold,

1

part: side. kemd: combed. 3 portend: signify. 4 I.e., the sun and moon move in equally regular courses. “Justice” also recalls the association of the movements of heavenly 2

bodies with the state of human affairs in the Proem. Osiris and Isis were identified with the sun and moon, respectively. 5 dispred: covered. 6 red: conceived. 7 line: linen.

Canto Seven

91

To shew that she had powre in things divine; And at her feete a Crocodile was rold, That with her1 wreathed taile her middle did enfold. 7

One foote was set uppon the Crocodile, And on the ground the other fast did stand, So meaning to suppresse both forged guile, And open force:2 and in her other hand She stretched forth a long white sclender wand. Such was the Goddesse; whom when Britomart Had long beheld, her selfe uppon the land She did prostrate, and with right humble hart, Unto her selfe her silent prayers did impart.

8

To which the Idoll as it were inclining, Her wand did move with amiable looke, By outward shew her inward sence desining.3 Who well perceiving, how her wand she shooke, It as a token of good fortune tooke. By this the day with dampe4 was overcast, And joyous light the house of Jove forsooke: Which when she saw, her helmet she unlaste, And by the altars side her selfe to slumber plaste.

9

For other beds the Priests there used none, But on their mother Earths deare lap did lie, And bake5 their sides uppon the cold hard stone, T’enure them selves to sufferaunce thereby And proud rebellious flesh to mortify. For by the vow of their religion They tied were to stedfast chastity, And continence of life, that all forgon, They mote the better tend to their devotion.

1 Perhaps a printer’s error, as the crocodile is male. 2 Crocodiles were traditionally associated with guile and force, luring victims with

feigned weeping, according to Gough. See Aptekar, 87–107. 3 desining: signifying. 4 dampe: fog. 5 bake: harden.

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10

Therefore they mote not taste of fleshly food, Ne feed on ought, the which doth bloud containe, Ne drinke of wine, for wine they say is blood, Even the bloud of Gyants, which were slaine, By thundring Jove in the Phlegrean plaine.1 For which the earth (as they the story tell) Wroth with the Gods, which to perpetuall paine Had damn’d her sonnes, which gainst them did rebell, With inward griefe and malice did against them swell.2

11

And of their vitall bloud, the which was shed Into her pregnant bosome, forth she brought The fruitfull vine, whose liquor blouddy red Having the mindes of men with fury fraught, Mote in them stirre up old rebellious thought, To make new warre against the Gods againe: Such is the powre of that same fruit, that nought The fell contagion may thereof restraine, Ne within reasons rule, her madding mood containe.

12

There did the warlike Maide her selfe repose, Under the wings of Isis all that night,3 And with sweete rest her heavy eyes did close, After that long daies toile and weary plight. Where whilest her earthly parts with soft delight Of sencelesse sleepe did deeply drowned lie, There did appeare unto her heavenly spright A wondrous vision, which did close4 implie The course of all her fortune and posteritie.

13

Her seem’d, as she was doing sacrifize To Isis, deckt with Mitre on her hed, And linnen stole after those Priestes guize, All sodainely she saw transfigured

1

The Titans, giants and sons of Earth, warred against Jove and lost. See Metamorphoses, 1.151–62; and Hesiod, Theogony, 617–735. For the association of wine with Titan blood, see Plutarch, Isis and Osiris, 6. 2 Earth swells with her malice, and, in the next stanza, with pregnancy and blood. The

Phlegrean Fields in Italy are also volcanic (Variorum, 220). 3 This image of protective wings appears frequently in the Psalms, e.g., 17.8, 36.7, 57.1. 4 close: secretly.

Canto Seven

93

Her linnen stole to robe of scarlet red, And Moone-like Mitre to a Crowne of gold, That even she her selfe much wondered At such a chaunge, and joyed to behold Her selfe, adorn’d with gems and jewels manifold.1 14

And in the midst of her felicity, An hideous tempest seemed from below, To rise through all the Temple sodainely, That from the Altar all about did blow The holy fire, and all the embers strow Uppon the ground, which kindled privily, Into outragious flames unwares did grow,2 That all the Temple put in jeopardy Of flaming, and her selfe in great perplexity.

15

With that the Crocodile, which sleeping lay Under the Idols feete in fearelesse bowre,3 Seem’d to awake in horrible dismay, As being troubled with that stormy stowre; And gaping greedy wide, did streight devoure Both flames and tempest: with which growen great, And swolne with pride of his owne peerelesse powre, He gan to threaten her likewise to eat; But that the Goddesse with her rod him backe did beat.

16

Tho turning all his pride to humblesse meeke, Him selfe before her feete he lowly threw, And gan for grace and love of her to seeke: Which she accepting, he so neare her drew, That of his game she soone enwombed grew, And forth did bring a Lion of great might; That shortly did all other beasts subdew. With that she waked, full of fearefull fright, And doubtfully dismayd4 through that so uncouth sight.

1

In this stanza it becomes impossible to distinguish Britomart from Isis. 2 In Book Three, Britomart twice describes her love for Artegall with images

of flames (III.ii.37, 43), as Hamilton points out. 3 fearelesse bowre: a safe sleeping place. 4 With a pun on lost virginity.

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17

So thereuppon long while she musing lay, With thousand thoughts feeding her fantasie, Untill she spide the lampe of lightsome day, Up-lifted in the porch of heaven hie. Then up she rose fraught with melancholy, And forth into the lower parts did pas; Whereas the Priestes she found full busily About their holy things for morrow Mas:1 Whom she saluting faire, faire resaluted was.

18

But by the change of her unchearefull looke, They might perceive, she was not well in plight;2 Or that some pensivenesse to heart she tooke. Therefore thus one of them, who seem’d in sight To be the greatest, and the gravest wight, To her bespake; “Sir Knight it seemes to me, That thorough evill rest of this last night, Or ill apayd,3 or much dismayd ye be, That by your change of cheare is easie for to see.”

19

“Certes” (sayd she) “sith ye so well have spide The troublous passion of my pensive mind, I will not seeke the same from you to hide, But will my cares unfolde, in hope to find Your aide, to guide me out of errour blind.” “Say on” (quoth he) “the secret of your hart: For by the holy vow, which me doth bind, I am adjur’d, best counsell to impart To all, that shall require my comfort in their smart.”

20

Then gan she to declare the whole discourse Of all that vision, which to her appeard, As well as to her minde it had recourse. All which when he unto the end had heard, Like to a weake faint-hearted man he fared,4 Through great astonishment of that strange sight;

1 2

morrow Mas: morning mass. plight: condition, mood.

3 4

Or ill apayd: either ill satisfied. fared: behaved.

Canto Seven

95

And with long locks up-standing, stifly stared Like one adawed1 with some dreadfull spright. So fild with heavenly fury, thus he her behight.2 21

“Magnificke Virgin, that in queint3 disguise Of British armes doest maske thy royall blood, So to pursue a perillous emprize, How could’st thou weene, through that disguized hood, To hide thy state from being understood? Can from th’immortall Gods ought hidden bee? They doe thy linage, and thy Lordly brood;4 They doe thy sire, lamenting sore for thee;5 They doe thy love, forlorne in womens thraldome see.

22

“The end whereof, and all the long event,6 They doe to thee in this same dreame discover. For that same Crocodile doth represent The righteous Knight, that is thy faithfull lover, Like to Osyris in all just endever.7 For that same Crocodile Osyris is, That under Isis feete doth sleepe for ever: To shew that clemence oft in things amis, Restraines those sterne behests,8 and cruell doomes of his.

23

“That Knight shall all the troublous stormes asswage, And raging flames, that many foes shall reare, To hinder thee from the just heritage Of thy sires Crowne, and from thy countrey deare. Then shalt thou take him to thy loved fere,9 And joyne in equall portion of thy realme: And afterwards a sonne to him shalt beare, That Lion-like shall shew his powre extreame. So blesse thee God, and give thee joyance of thy dreame.”10

1

adawed: daunted. fury: prophetic furor; behight: hailed. 3 queint: unusual, cunning, refined. 4 brood: descendants. 2

5

Britomart secretly left her father, King Ryence, to become a knight (III.ii–iii). 6 event: outcome. 7 Osiris was often associated with the

crocodile. The priest blends Artegall into his interpretation as well. 8 behests: commands. 9 fere: husband. 10 The priest foresees what Merlin has also prophesied (III.iii.24–30), that Artegall and Britomart will establish the line of British monarchs. The lion (16.6 and 23.8) is a traditional emblem of British kings.

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24

All which when she unto the end had heard, She much was eased in her troublous thought, And on those Priests bestowed rich reward: And royall gifts of gold and silver wrought, She for a present to their Goddesse brought. Then taking leave of them, she forward went, To seeke her love, where he was to be sought; Ne rested till she came without relent Unto the land of Amazons, as she was bent.

25

Whereof when newes to Radigund was brought, Not with amaze, as women wonted bee, She was confused in her troublous thought,1 But fild with courage and with joyous glee, As glad to heare of armes, the which now she Had long surceast, she bad to open2 bold, That she the face of her new foe might see. But when they of that yron man had told, Which late her folke had slaine, she bad them forth to hold.3

26

So there without the gate (as seemed best) She caused her Pavilion be pight; In which stout Britomart her selfe did rest, Whiles Talus watched at the dore all night. All night likewise, they of the towne in fright, Uppon their wall good watch and ward did keepe. The morrow next, so soone as dawning light Bad doe away the dampe4 of drouzie sleepe, The warlike Amazon out of her bowre did peepe.5

27

And caused streight a Trumpet loud to shrill, To warne her foe to battell soone be prest:6 Who long before awoke (for she ful ill Could sleepe all night, that in unquiet brest Did closely harbour such a jealous guest)

1

I.e., Radigund is not confused and amazed in womanly fashion. 2 I.e., the gates. 3 forth to hold: to march out. 4 dampe: fog.

5

Britomart’s battle with Radigund resembles the fight between Ariosto’s Marfisa and Bradamante (Orlando, 36.44–84). It is often read as an allegory for Elizabeth’s ongoing confrontation with Mary, Queen of Scots (Variorum, 221, 316). 6 prest: ready.

Canto Seven

97

Was to the battell whilome ready dight.1 Eftsoones that warriouresse with haughty crest Did forth issue, all ready for the fight: On th’other side her foe appeared soone in sight. 28

But ere they reared hand, the Amazone Began the streight2 conditions to propound, With which she used still to tye her fone;3 To serve her so, as she the rest had bound. Which when the other heard, she sternly frownd For high disdaine of such indignity, And would no lenger treat, but bad them sound.4 For her no other termes should ever tie Then what prescribed were by lawes of chevalrie.

29

The Trumpets sound, and they together run With greedy rage, and with their faulchins5 smot; Ne either sought the others strokes to shun, But through great fury both their skill forgot, And practicke use in armes: ne spared not Their dainty parts, which nature had created So faire and tender, without staine or spot, For other uses, then they them translated; Which they now hackt and hewd, as if such use they hated,6

30

As when a Tygre and a Lionesse7 Are met at spoyling of some hungry pray, Both challenge8 it with equall greedinesse: But first the Tygre clawes thereon did lay; And therefore loth to loose her right away, Doth in defence thereof full stoutly stond:

1

dight: equipped. streight: strict. 3 fone: foes. In contrast, Artegall accepts Radigund’s terms (iv.49–51). 4 sound: blow the trumpet to begin combat. 5 faulchins: curved swords. 2

6

Their disdain for, and hacking of, their dainty parts recalls the tradition by which Amazons cut off one breast. 7 Britomart is frequently associated with lions, as royal beasts, and Radigund fits the traditional cruelty of the tiger, forming in this stanza an allegory of their relationship to Artegall––as well as a cat fight. 8 challenge: claim.

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To which the Lion strongly doth gainesay, That she to hunt the beast first tooke in hond; And therefore ought it have, where ever she it fond. 31

Full fiercely layde the Amazon about, And dealt her blowes unmercifully sore: Which Britomart withstood with courage stout, And them repaide againe with double more. So long they fought, that all the grassie flore Was fild with bloud, which from their sides did flow, And gushed through their armes, that all in gore They trode, and on the ground their lives did strow,1 Like fruitles seede, of which untimely death should grow.

32

At last proud Radigund with fell despight, Having by chaunce espide advantage neare, Let drive at her with all her dreadfull might, And thus upbrayding said; “This token beare Unto the man, whom thou doest love so deare; And tell him for his sake thy life thou gavest.”2 Which spitefull words she sore engriev’d to heare, Thus answer’d; “Lewdly thou my love depravest,3 Who shortly must repent that now so vainely bravest.”4

33

Nath’lesse that stroke so cruell passage found, That glauncing on her shoulder plate, it bit Unto the bone, and made a griesly wound, That she her shield through raging smart of it Could scarse uphold; yet soone she it requit. For having force increast through furious paine, She her5 so rudely on the helmet smit, That it empierced to the very braine, And her proud person low prostrated on the plaine.

1

strow: strew. Radigund implies that she has killed Artegall, and that Britomart will see him in death. 3 depravest: pervert, corrupt, defame. It is unclear whether Britomart is responding to 2

Radigund’s claim that she has killed Artegall, or to the assumption that she has seduced him. 4 bravest: boasts. 5 I.e., Britomart strikes Radigund.

Canto Seven

34

Where being layd,1 the wrothfull Britonesse Stayd not, till she came to her selfe againe, But in revenge both of her loves distresse, And her late vile reproch, though vaunted vaine,2 And also of her wound, which sore did paine, She with one stroke both head and helmet cleft. Which dreadfull sight, when all her warlike traine There present saw, each one of sence bereft, Fled fast into the towne, and her sole victor left.

35

But yet so fast they could not home retrate, But that swift Talus did the formost win;3 And pressing through the preace unto the gate, Pelmell with them attonce did enter in. There then a piteous slaughter did begin: For all that ever came within his reach, He with his yron flale did thresh so thin, That he no worke at all left for the leach:4 Like to an hideous storme, which nothing may empeach.5

36

And now by this the noble Conqueresse Her selfe came in, her glory to partake; Where though revengefull vow she did professe, Yet when she saw the heapes, which he did make, Of slaughtred carkasses, her heart did quake For very ruth, which did it almost rive,6 That she his fury willed him to slake: For else he sure had left not one alive, But all in his revenge of spirite would deprive.7

37

Tho8 when she had his execution stayd, She for that yron prison did enquire, In which her wretched love was captive layd:

1

I.e., Radigund is laid on the plain. The vile reproach is Radigund’s suggestion that she has killed, and perhaps slept with, Artegall––which is a vain boast. 3 the formost win: overtake them. 4 leach: doctor; also the blood-sucking worm used by doctors, suggesting that Talus has spilled all their blood. 2

5

99

empeach: impede. rive: crack. 7 Britomart calling Talus off is compared by Hamilton to Elizabeth calling Lord Grey back from Ireland. For Britomart’s pity, see Introduction, 2. 8 Tho: then. 6

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Which breaking open with indignant ire, She entred into all the partes entire.1 Where when she saw that lothly uncouth sight, Of men disguiz’d in womanishe attire, Her heart gan grudge, for very deepe despight Of so unmanly maske, in misery misdight. 38

At last when as to her owne Love she came, Whom like disguize no lesse deformed had, At sight thereof abasht with secrete shame, She turnd her head aside, as nothing glad, To have beheld a spectacle so bad: And then too well beleev’d, that which tofore Jealous suspect2 as true untruely drad, Which vaine conceipt now nourishing no more, She sought with ruth to salve his sad misfortunes sore.3

39

Not so great wonder and astonishment, Did the most chast Penelope possesse, To see her Lord, that was reported drent,4 And dead long since in dolorous distresse, Come home to her in piteous wretchednesse, After long travell of full twenty yeares, That she knew not his favours likelynesse,5 For many scarres and many hoary heares, But stood long staring on him, mongst uncertaine feares.

40

“Ah my deare Lord, what sight is this” (quoth she) “What May-game6 hath misfortune made of you? Where is that dreadfull manly looke? where be Those mighty palmes, the which ye wont t’embrew7 In bloud of Kings, and great hoastes to subdew? Could ought on earth so wondrous change have wrought,

1

entire: inner. suspect: suspicion. 3 These complicated lines seem to say that, upon seeing Artegall, Britomart no longer believes her earlier jealous suspicions, and now seeks to soothe his misfortune. 2

4

drent: drowned. For Penelope, see Homer, Odyssey, 23.92–102. 5 likelynesse: likeness. 6 Referring to the parodic tradition of dressing a man up as the May Queen in the spring festival. 7 t’embrew: to soak, stain.

Canto Seven

101

As to have robde you of that manly hew?1 Could so great courage stouped have to ought? Then farewell fleshly force; I see thy pride is nought.” 41

Thenceforth she streight into a bowre him brought, And causd him those uncomely weedes undight;2 And in their steede for other rayment sought, Whereof there was great store, and armors bright, Which had bene reft3 from many a noble Knight; Whom that proud Amazon subdewed had, Whilest Fortune favourd her successe in fight, In which when as she him anew had clad, She was reviv’d, and joyd much in his semblance glad.

42

So there a while they afterwards remained, Him to refresh, and her late wounds to heale: During which space she there as Princes4 rained, And changing all that forme of common weale, The liberty of women did repeale, Which they had long usurpt; and them restoring To mens subjection, did true Justice deale:5 That all they as a Goddesse her adoring, Her wisedome did admire, and hearkned to her loring.6

43

For all those Knights, which long in captive shade Had shrowded bene, she did from thraldome free; And magistrates of all that city made, And gave to them great living and large fee:7 And that they should for ever faithfull bee, Made them sweare fealty to Artegall. Who when him selfe now well recur’d did see, He purposd to proceed, what so be fall, Uppon his first adventure, which him forth did call.

1

hew: appearance. undight: take off. 3 reft: robbed. 4 Princes: Princess. 5 See v.25. The problem of Elizabeth com2

plicates both passages. Also see Introduction, 7. 6 loring: teaching of lore. 7 great living and large fee: great estates and large wealth.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

102 44

Full sad and sorrowfull was Britomart For his departure, her new cause of griefe; Yet wisely moderated her owne smart, Seeing his honor, which she tendred1 chiefe, Consisted much in that adventures priefe.2 The care whereof, and hope of his successe Gave unto her great comfort and reliefe, That womanish complaints she did represse, And tempred for the time her present heavinesse.

45

There she continu’d for a certaine space, Till through his want3 her woe did more increase: Then hoping that the change of aire and place Would change her paine, and sorrow somewhat ease, She parted thence, her anguish to appease. Meane while her noble Lord sir Artegall Went on his way, ne ever howre did cease, Till he redeemed had that Lady thrall:4 That for another Canto will more fitly fall.

1 2

tendred: valued. priefe: proof.

3 4

want: lack. I.e., Irena.

Canto Eight Prince Arthure and Sir Artegall, Free Samient from feare: They slay the Soudan, drive his wife, Adicia to despaire.

1

Nought under heaven so strongly doth allure The sence of man, and all his minde possesse, As beauties lovely baite, that doth procure1 Great warriours oft their rigour to represse, And mighty hands forget their manlinesse; Drawne with the powre of an heart-robbing eye, And wrapt in fetters of a golden tresse, That can with melting pleasaunce mollifye Their hardned hearts, enur’d to bloud and cruelty.

2

So whylome learnd that mighty Jewish swaine,2 Each of whose lockes did match a man in might, To lay his spoiles before his lemans traine:3 So also did that great Oetean Knight4 For his loves sake his Lions skin undight: And so did warlike Antony neglect The worlds whole rule for Cleopatras sight.5 Such wondrous powre hath wemens faire aspect, To captive men, and make them all the world reject.

3

Yet could it not sterne Artegall retaine, Nor hold from suite6 of his avowed quest, Which he had undertane to Gloriane;

1

procure: cause, persuade, with the background sense of procuring sex.

2

Samson, who revealed to Dalila that his strength lay in his hair. She called in the Philistines, who cut his hair. (Judg. 16). 3 lemans traine: lover’s snare. 4 Hercules, who allowed Iole to wear his lion’s skin when he took on women’s cloth-

ing and spun on a distaff, as recounted in v.24. 5 Spenser here follows Tasso, who places Hercules and Antony on the gates to Armida’s palace (Gerusalemme Liberata, 16: 1–7). 6 suite: pursuit.

103

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But left his love, albe1 her strong request, Faire Britomart in languor and unrest, And rode him selfe uppon his first intent: Ne day nor night did ever idly rest; Ne wight but onely Talus with him went, The true guide of his way and vertuous government.2 4

So travelling, he chaunst far off to heed A Damzell, flying on a palfrey3 fast Before two Knights, that after her did speed With all their powre, and her full fiercely chast In hope to have her overhent4 at last: Yet fled she fast, and both them farre outwent, Carried with wings of feare, like fowle aghast, With locks all loose, and rayment all to rent;5 And ever as she rode, her eye was backeward bent.

5

Soone after these he saw another Knight, That after those two former rode apace, With speare in rest, and prickt6 with all his might: So ran they all, as they had bene at bace,7 They being chased, that did others chase. At length he saw the hindmost overtake One of those two, and force him turne his face; How ever loth he were his way to slake, Yet mote he algates8 now abide, and answere make.

6

But th’other still pursu’d the fearefull Mayd; Who still from him as fast away did flie, Ne once for ought her speedy passage stayd, Till that at length she did before her spie Sir Artegall, to whom she streight did hie With gladfull hast, in hope of him to get Succour against her greedy enimy: Who seeing her approch gan forward set, To save her from her feare, and him from force to let.9

1

albe: despite. See Introduction, 5. 3 palfrey: a small horse for ladies. 4 overhent: overtaken. 5 all to rent: altogether torn. 2

6

prickt: rode. bace: a children’s game in which the chasers are alternately chased. 7 8 9

algates: nevertheless. let: prevent.

Canto Eight

105

7

But he like hound full greedy of his pray, Being impatient of impediment, Continu’d still his course, and by the way Thought with his speare him quight have overwent. So both together ylike felly1 bent, Like fiercely met. But Artegall was stronger, And better skild in Tilt and Turnament, And bore him quite out of his saddle, longer Then two speares length; So mischiefe overmatcht the wronger.

8

And in his fall misfortune him mistooke;2 For on his head unhappily he pight, That his owne waight his necke asunder broke, And left there dead. Meane while the other Knight Defeated had the other faytour3 quight, And all his bowels in his body brast:4 Whom leaving there in that dispiteous5 plight, He ran still on, thinking to follow fast His other fellow Pagan, which before him past.

9

In stead of whom finding there ready prest6 Sir Artegall, without discretion He at him ran, with ready speare in rest: Who seeing him come still so fiercely on, Against him made againe. So both anon Together met, and strongly either strooke And broke their speares; yet neither has forgon His horses backe, yet to and fro long shooke, And tottred like two towres, which through a tempest quooke.

10

But when againe they had recovered sence, They drew their swords, in mind to make amends For what their speares had fayled of their pretence.7 Which when the Damzell, who those deadly ends Of both her foes had seene, and now her frends For her beginning a more fearefull fray,

1

5

2

6

ylike felly: equally fiercely. mistooke: seized. 3 faytour: miscreant. 4 brast: burst.

dispiteous: pitiless. ready prest: at hand, armed. 7 pretence: intention.

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She to them runnes in hast, and her haire rends, Crying to them their cruell hands to stay, Untill they both doe heare, what she to them will say. 11

They stayd their hands, when she thus gan to speake; “Ah gentle Knights, what meane ye thus unwise Upon your selves anothers wrong to wreake? I am the wrong’d, whom ye did enterprise1 Both to redresse, and both redrest likewise: Witnesse the Paynims both, whom ye may see There dead on ground. What doe ye then devise Of more revenge? if more, then I am shee, Which was the roote of all, end your revenge on mee.”

12

Whom when they heard so say, they lookt about, To weete if it were true, as she had told; Where when they saw their foes dead out of doubt, Eftsoones they gan their wrothfull hands to hold, And Ventailes2 reare, each other to behold. Tho when as Artegall did Arthure 3 vew, So faire a creature, and so wondrous bold, He much admired both his heart and hew, And touched with intire affection, nigh him drew.

13

Saying, “Sir Knight, of pardon I you pray, That all unweeting4 have you wrong’d thus sore, Suffring my hand against my heart to stray: Which if ye please forgive, I will therefore Yeeld for amends my selfe yours evermore, Or what so penaunce shall by you be red.”5 To whom the Prince; “Certes me needeth more To crave the same, whom errour so misled, As that I did mistake the living for the ded.

14

“But sith ye please, that both our blames shall die, Amends may for the trespasse soone be made, Since neither is endamadg’d much thereby.”

1

enterprise: undertake. Ventailes: face mask of the helmet. 3 The king of national legend, and an allegory of Magnificence, according to the 2

“Letter to Raleigh.” Arthur is often called “The Prince.” See Introduction, 10. 4 unweeting: unknowing. 5 red: declared. Artegall offers to do homage and to serve him.

Canto Eight

107

So can they both them selves full eath1 perswade To faire accordaunce, and both faults to shade, Either embracing other lovingly, And swearing faith to either on his blade, Never thenceforth to nourish enmity, But either others cause to maintaine mutually. 15

Then Artegall gan of the Prince enquire, What were those knights, which there on ground were layd, And had receiv’d their follies worthy hire,2 And for what cause they chased so that Mayd. “Certes I wote not well” (the Prince then sayd) “But by adventure3 found them faring so, As by the way unweetingly I strayd, And lo the Damzell selfe, whence all did grow, Of whom we may at will the whole occasion know.”

16

Then they that Damzell called to them nie, And asked her, what were those two her fone, From whom she earst so fast away did flie; And what was she her selfe so woe begone, And for what cause pursu’d of them attone.4 To whom she thus; “Then wote ye well, that I Doe serve a Queene, that not far hence doth wone,5 A Princesse of great powre and majestie, Famous through all the world, and honor’d far and nie.

17

“Her name Mercilla6 most men use to call; That is a mayden Queene of high renowne, For her great bounty knowen over all, And soveraine grace, with which her royall crowne She doth support, and strongly beateth downe The malice of her foes, which her envy, And at her happinesse do fret and frowne: Yet she her selfe the more doth magnify, And even to her foes her mercies multiply.

1

5

2

6

can: did; eath: easily. hire: reward. 3 adventure: chance. 4 attone: both.

wone: live. Celebrating mercy, Mercilla, the “mayden Queene,” is perhaps the most extensively drawn figure for Elizabeth in The Faerie Queene. See Introduction, 8.

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18

“Mongst many which maligne her happy state, There is a mighty man,1 which wonnes here by That with most fell despight and deadly hate, Seekes to subvert her Crowne and dignity, And all his powre doth thereunto apply: And her good Knights, of which so brave a band Serves her, as any Princesse under sky, He either spoiles,2 if they against him stand, Or to his part allures, and bribeth under hand.

19

“Ne him sufficeth all the wrong and ill, Which he unto her people does each day, But that he seekes by traytrous traines to spill3 Her person, and her sacred selfe to slay: That O ye heavens defend, and turne away From her, unto the miscreant him selfe, That neither hath religion nor fay,4 But makes his God of his ungodly pelfe,5 And Idols serves; so let his Idols serve the Elfe.

20

“To all which cruell tyranny they say, He is provokt, and stird up day and night By his bad wife, that hight Adicia,6 Who counsels him through confidence of might, To breake all bonds of law, and rules of right. For she her selfe professeth mortall foe To Justice, and against her still doth fight, Working to all, that love her, deadly woe, And making all her Knights and people to doe so.

21

“Which my liege Lady seeing, thought it best, With that his wife in friendly wise to deale, For stint of strife, and stablishment of rest Both to her selfe, and to her common weale, And all forepast displeasures to repeale.

1

Often read as a figure for King Philip of Spain, who opposed Elizabeth and whose Catholicism was frequently considered idolatrous by English Protestants. 2 spoiles: destroys. 3 spill: overthrow.

4

fay: faith. pelfe: riches––Spain’s plunder of the Indies, according to Gough. 6 In Greek, “Injustice.” Gough associates her with Spain’s “inquisitous government” (258). Spenser links her most of all with pride. 5

Canto Eight

109

So me in message unto her she sent, To treat with her by way of enterdeale,1 Of finall peace and faire attonement,2 Which might concluded be by mutuall consent. 22

“All times have wont safe passage to afford To messengers, that come for causes just: But this proude Dame disdayning all accord, Not onely into bitter termes forth brust,3 Reviling me, and rayling as she lust,4 But lastly to make proofe of utmost shame, Me like a dog she out of dores did thrust, Miscalling me by many a bitter name, That never did her ill, ne once deserved blame.

23

“And lastly, that no shame might wanting be, When I was gone, soone after me she sent These two false Knights, whom there ye lying see, To be by them dishonoured and shent:5 But thankt be God, and your good hardiment,6 They have the price of their owne folly payd.” So said this Damzell, that hight Samient,7 And to those knights, for their so noble ayd, Her selfe most gratefull shew’d, and heaped thanks repayd.

24

But they now having throughly heard, and seene Al those great wrongs, the which that mayd complained To have bene done against her Lady Queene, By that proud dame, which her so much disdained, Were moved much thereat, and twixt them fained,8 With all their force to worke avengement strong Uppon the Souldan9 selfe, which it mayntained, And on his Lady, th’author of that wrong, And uppon all those Knights, that did to her belong.

1

enterdeale: negotiation. Mercilla’s attempt at peaceful relations celebrates Elizabeth’s efforts to avoid open war with Spain. 2 attonement: concord. 3 brust: burst. 4 lust: pleased. 5 shent: defiled.

6

hardiment: courage. Based on the obsolete English “sam,” meaning together or mutually, means “bringing together.” 8 fained: desired. 9 The “mighty man” of 18.2, here named the Souldan, or sultan, a pagan ruler. See Tasso, Gerusalemme Liberata, 9. 7

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25

But thinking best by counterfet disguise To their deseigne to make the easier way, They did this complot1 twixt them selves devise, First that sir Artegall should him array, Like one of those two Knights, which dead there lay. And then that Damzell, the sad Samient, Should as his purchast 2 prize with him convay Unto the Souldans court, her to present Unto his scornefull Lady, that for her had sent.

26

So as they had deviz’d, sir Artegall Him clad in th’armour of a Pagan knight, And taking with him, as his vanquisht thrall, That Damzell, led her to the Souldans right.3 Where soone as his proud wife of her had sight, Forth of her window as she looking lay, She weened streight, it was her Paynim Knight, Which brought that Damzell, as his purchast pray; And sent to him a Page, that mote direct his way.

27

Who bringing them to their appointed place, Offred his service to disarme4 the Knight; But he refusing him to let unlace, For doubt to be discovered by his sight, Kept himselfe still in his straunge armour dight.5 Soone after whom the Prince arrived there, And sending to the Souldan in despight A bold defyance, did of him requere That Damzell, whom he held as wrongfull prisonere.

28

Wherewith the Souldan all with furie fraught, Swearing, and banning6 most blasphemously, Commaunded straight his armour to be brought, And mounting straight upon a charret7 hye,

1

6

2

7

complot: joint plot. purchast: acquired. 3 right: territory. 4 disarme: undress. 5 straunge: belonging to another; dight: dressed.

banning: cursing. charret: chariot. With its height and iron hooks, the Souldan’s chariot resembles a Spanish galleon. Stanzas 28 to 45 are generally read as allegorizing the defeat of the Spanish Armada. See Variorum, 226–28. Also see 2 Macc. 13.2.

Canto Eight

111

With yron wheeles and hookes arm’d dreadfully, And drawne of cruell steedes, which he had fed With flesh of men, whom through fell tyranny He slaughtred had, and ere they were halfe ded, Their bodies to his beasts for provender did spred. 29

So forth he came all in a cote of plate, Burnisht with bloudie rust, whiles on the greene1 The Briton Prince him readie did awayte, In glistering armes right goodly well beseene, That shone as bright, as doth the heaven sheene; And by his stirrup Talus did attend, Playing his pages part, as he had beene Before directed by his Lord; to th’end He should his flale to finall execution bend.

30

Thus goe they both together to their geare,2 With like fierce minds, but meanings different: For the proud Souldan with presumpteous cheare,3 And countenance sublime and insolent, Sought onely slaughter and avengement: But the brave Prince for honour and for right, Gainst tortious powre and lawlesse regiment,4 In the behalfe of wronged weake did fight: More in his causes truth he trusted then in might.

31

Like to the Thracian Tyrant, who they say Unto his horses gave his guests for meat, Till he himselfe was made their greedie pray, And torne in peeces by Alcides great.5 So thought the Souldan in his follies threat, Either the Prince in peeces to have torne With his sharpe wheeles, in his first rages heat, Or under his fierce horses feet have borne And trampled downe in dust his thoughts disdained scorne.6

1

greene: a lawn, but alluding to the sea, as Hamilton suggests. 2 geare: business. 3 cheare: expression. 4 tortious: wrongful; regiment: government.

5 Diomedes, King of Thrace, fed his guests to his horses, and suffered the same end at the hands of Hercules. See Metamorphoses, 9.194–96. 6 I.e., the Souldan would have trampled Arthur, who was his thoughts’ disdained scorne.

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32

But the bold child1 that perill well espying, If he too rashly to his charet drew, Gave way unto his horses speedie flying, And their resistlesse rigour did eschew. Yet as he passed by, the Pagan threw A shivering dart with so impetuous force, That had he not it shun’d with heedfull vew, It had himselfe transfixed, or his horse, Or made them both one masse withouten more remorse.

33

Oft drew the Prince unto his charret nigh, In hope some stroke to fasten on him neare; But he was mounted in his seat so high, And his wingfooted coursers him did beare So fast away, that ere his readie speare He could advance, he farre was gone and past. Yet still he him did follow every where, And followed was of him likewise full fast; So long as in his steedes the flaming breath did last.

34

Againe the Pagan threw another dart, Of which he had with him abundant store, On every side of his embatteld2 cart, And of all other weapons lesse or more, Which warlike uses had deviz’d of yore. The wicked shaft guyded through th’ayrie wyde, By some bad spirit, that it to mischiefe bore, Stayd not, till through his curat3 it did glyde, And made a griesly wound in his enriven4 side.

35

Much was he grieved with that haplesse throe,5 That opened had the welspring of his blood; But much the more that to his hatefull foe He mote not come, to wreake his wrathfull mood. That made him rave, like to a Lyon wood,6 Which being wounded of the huntsmans hand

1

A chivalric term for a knight or young nobleman. Spenser usually uses it for Arthur. 2 embatteld: fortified, armored. 3 curat: breastplate.

4

enriven: torn. throe: the Souldan’s throw as well as his own convulsion of pain. 6 wood: mad. 5

Canto Eight

113

Can not come neare him in the covert wood, Where he with boughes hath built his shady stand, And fenst himselfe about with many a flaming brand. 36

Still when he sought t’approch unto him ny, His charret wheeles about him whirled round, And made him backe againe as fast to fly; And eke his steedes like to an hungry hound, That hunting after game hath carrion found, So cruelly did him pursew and chace, That his good steed, all1 were he much renound For noble courage, and for hardie race, Durst not endure their sight, but fled from place to place.

37

Thus long they trast,2 and traverst to and fro, Seeking by every way to make some breach, Yet could the Prince not nigh unto him goe, That one sure stroke he might unto him reach, Whereby his strengthes assay3 he might him teach. At last from his victorious shield he drew The vaile, which did his powrefull light empeach;4 And comming full before his horses vew, As they upon him prest, it plaine to them did shew.5

38

Like lightening flash, that hath the gazer burned, So did the sight thereof their sense dismay, That backe againe upon themselves they turned, And with their ryder ranne perforce6 away: Ne could the Souldan them from flying stay, With raynes, or wonted rule, as well he knew. Nought feared they, what he could do, or say, But th’onely feare, that was before their vew;7 From which like mazed deare,8 dismayfully they flew.

1 2

all: although.

trast: traced. assay: proof. 4 empeach: block. 5 In Book One, Arthur’s shield is accidentally unveiled with equally potent effect (I.viii.19). In all other fights until now, Arthur keeps it covered. The ease with 3

which Arthur’s shield confuses and defeats the enemy is often likened to the miraculous destruction and burning of the Armada. Also see Orlando, 10.107–10; 22.85–87. 6 perforce: forcibly. 7 I.e., they feared nothing but what was in their view, the shield. 8 mazed deare: terrified deer.

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39

Fast did they fly, as them their feete could beare, High over hilles, and lowly over dales, As they were follow’d of their former feare. In vaine the Pagan bannes,1 and sweares, and rayles, And backe with both his hands unto him hayles2 The resty3 raynes, regarded now no more: He to them calles and speakes, yet nought avayles; They heare him not, they have forgot his lore,4 But go, which way they list, their guide they have forlore.5

40

As when the firie-mouthed steeds, which drew The Sunnes bright wayne6 to Phaetons decay, Soone as they did the monstrous Scorpion vew, With ugly craples7 crawling in their way, The dreadfull sight did them so sore affray, That their well knowne courses they forwent, And leading th’ever-burning lampe astray, This lower world nigh all to ashes brent, And left their scorched path yet in the firmament.8

41

Such was the furie of these head-strong steeds, Soone as the infants9 sunlike shield they saw, That all obedience both to words and deeds They quite forgot, and scornd all former law; Through woods, and rocks, and mountaines they did draw The yron charet, and the wheeles did teare, And tost the Paynim, without feare or awe; From side to side they tost him here and there, Crying to them in vaine, that nould10 his crying heare.

1

bannes: curses. hayles: hauls. 3 resty: resisting control. 4 lore: training. 5 forlore: abandoned. 6 wayne: chariot. Phaethon, son of Helios the sun god, was allowed to drive the horses of the sun for one day, but lost control and set fire to the world. Along the way he en2

countered the constellation Scorpio. See Metamorphoses, 1.748–2.332. 7 craples: grapples, claws. 8 I.e., the Milky Way. See Chaucer, The House of Fame, 2.935–56. 9 As with “child,” a chivalric term for Arthur. 10 nould: would not. The horses toss the Souldan just as the Spanish Armada was severely damaged by storms.

Canto Eight

42

Yet still the Prince pursew’d him close behind, Oft making offer him to smite, but found No easie meanes according to his mind. At last they have all overthrowne to ground Quite topside turvey, and the pagan hound Amongst the yron hookes and graples keene, Torne all to rags, and rent with many a wound, That no whole peece of him was to be seene, But scattred all about, and strow’d upon the greene.

43

Like as the cursed sonne of Theseus,1 That following his chace in dewy morne, To fly his stepdames love outrageous, Of his owne steedes was all to peeces torne, And his faire limbs left in the woods forlorne; That for his sake Diana did lament, And all the wooddy Nymphes did wayle and mourne. So was this Souldan rapt and all to rent,2 That of his shape appear’d no litle moniment.3

44

Onely his shield and armour, which there lay, Though nothing whole, but all to brusd and broken, He up did take, and with him brought away, That mote remaine for an eternall token To all, mongst whom this storie should be spoken, How worthily, by heavens high decree, Justice that day of wrong her selfe had wroken,4 That all men which that spectacle did see, By like ensample mote for ever warned bee.

45

So on a tree, before the Tyrants dore, He caused them be hung in all mens sight, To be a moniment for evermore. Which when his Ladie from the castles hight Beheld, it much appald her troubled spright: Yet not, as women wont in dolefull fit,

1

Hippolytus, who was dragged to death by his own horses. He refused his stepmother Phaedra’s advances, and she claimed that he had seduced her, leading Theseus to curse his son. See I.v.37–39 and Metamorphoses, 15.497–546.

2

115

rapt: overwhelmed: all to rent: altogether torn. 3 moniment: trace. 4 wroken: avenged.

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She was dismayd, or faynted through affright, But gathered unto her her troubled wit, And gan eftsoones devize to be aveng’d for it. 46

Streight downe she ranne, like an enraged cow, That is berobbed of her youngling dere, With knife in hand, and fatally did vow, To wreake her on that mayden messengere, Whom she had causd be kept as prisonere, By Artegall, misween’d1 for her owne Knight, That brought her backe. And comming present there, She at her ran with all her force and might, All flaming with revenge and furious despight.

47

Like raging Ino,2 when with knife in hand She threw her husbands murdred infant out, Or fell Medea,3 when on Colchicke strand Her brothers bones she scattered all about; Or as that madding mother,4 mongst the rout Of Bacchus Priests her owne deare flesh did teare. Yet neither Ino, nor Medea stout, Nor all the Maenades so furious were, As this bold woman, when she saw that Damzell there.

48

But Artegall being thereof aware, Did stay her cruell hand, ere she her raught,5 And as she did her selfe to strike prepare, Out of her fist the wicked weapon caught: With that like one enfelon’d6 or distraught, She forth did rome, whether7 her rage her bore, With franticke passion, and with furie fraught; And breaking forth out at a posterne dore,8 Unto the wyld wood ranne, her dolours to deplore.

1

misween’d: mistaken. Ino madly threw herself and her son from a cliff into the sea. See Metamorphoses, 4.512–42. 3 Medea assisted Jason in obtaining the Golden Fleece from Colchis. She scattered parts of her brother’s body as a ploy to escape from her father. 2

4 Agave, who, in a frenzy, tore her son Pentheus to pieces. He was spying on her as she and other devotees (Maenades) worshipped Bacchus. See Metamorphoses, 3.701–33, and Euripides, Bacchae. 5 raught: reached. 6 enfelon’d: angered, made murderous. 7 whether: whither. 8 posterne dore: back door.

Canto Eight

49

As a mad bytch, when as the franticke fit Her burning tongue with rage inflamed hath, Doth runne at randon, and with furious bit Snatching at every thing, doth wreake her wrath On man and beast, that commeth in her path.1 There they doe say, that she transformed was Into a Tygre, and that Tygres scath2 In crueltie and outrage she did pas, To prove her surname true, that she imposed has.

50

Then Artegall himselfe discovering plaine, Did issue forth gainst all that warlike rout Of knights and armed men, which did maintaine That Ladies part, and to the Souldan lout:3 All which he did assault with courage stout, All were they nigh an hundred knights of name, And like wyld Goates them chaced all about, Flying from place to place with cowheard4 shame, So that with finall force them all he overcame.

51

Then caused he the gates be opened wyde, And there the Prince, as victour of that day, With tryumph entertayn’d and glorifyde, Presenting him with all the rich array, And roiall pompe, which there long hidden lay, Purchast through lawlesse powre and tortious5 wrong Of that proud Souldan, whom he earst did slay. So both for rest there having stayd not long, Marcht with that mayd, fit matter for another song.

1

Cf. Hecuba’s transformation to a dog (Metamorphoses, 13.533–75). 2 scath: doing harm. 3 lout: bow.

4

117

cowheard: coward. The spelling evokes Artegall’s herding of the knights like wild goats. 5 tortious: hurtful.

Canto Nine Arthur and Artegall catch Guyle whom Talus doth dismay, They to Mercillaes pallace come, and see her rich array.

1

What Tygre, or what other salvage wight1 Is so exceeding furious and fell, As wrong, when it hath arm’d it selfe with might? Not fit mongst men, that doe with reason mell,2 But mongst wyld beasts and salvage woods to dwell; Where still the stronger doth the weake devoure, And they that most in boldnesse doe excell, Are dreadded most, and feared for their powre: Fit for Adicia, there to build her wicked bowre.

2

There let her wonne3 farre from resort of men, Where righteous Artegall her late exyled; There let her ever keepe her damned den, Where none may be with her lewd parts defyled, Nor none but beasts may be of her despoyled: And turne we to the noble Prince, where late We did him leave, after that he had foyled The cruell Souldan, and with dreadfull fate4 Had utterly subverted his unrighteous state.

3

Where having with Sir Artegall a space Well solast5 in that Souldans late delight, They both resolving now to leave the place, Both it and all the wealth therein behight6 Unto that Damzell in her Ladies right, And so would have departed on their way.

1

4

2

5

salvage wight: savage creature. mell: associate. 3 wonne: dwell.

fate: judgment. solast: taken comfort. 6 behight: granted.

118

Canto Nine

119

But she them woo’d by all the meanes she might, And earnestly besought, to wend that day With her, to see her Ladie thence not farre away. 4

By whose entreatie both they overcommen, Agree to goe with her, and by the way, (As often falles) of sundry things did commen.1 Mongst which that Damzell did to them bewray A straunge adventure, which not farre thence lay; To weet a wicked villaine, bold and stout, Which wonned in a rocke not farre away, That robbed all the countrie there about, And brought the pillage home, whence none could get it out.

5

Thereto both his owne wylie wit, (she sayd) And eke the fastnesse2 of his dwelling place, Both unassaylable, gave him great ayde: For he so crafty was to forge and face,3 So light of hand, and nymble of his pace, So smooth of tongue, and subtile in his tale, That could deceive one looking in his face; Therefore by name Malengin4 they him call, Well knowen by his feates, and famous over all.

6

Through these his slights5 he many doth confound, And eke the rocke, in which he wonts to dwell, Is wondrous strong, and hewen farre under ground A dreadfull depth, how deepe no man can tell; But some doe say, it goeth downe to hell. And all within, it full of wyndings is, And hidden wayes, that scarce an hound by smell Can follow out those false footsteps of his, Ne none can backe returne, that once are gone amis.

1

commen: commune. fastnesse: strength. 3 forge and face: to forge mischief and present a false face. 4 Suggesting in Latin evil machinations. 2

Also called Guyle in the argument. Gough associates Malengin and his guile with the guerilla warfare of the Irish (271). See A View, 96. 5 slights: tricks.

120

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7

Which when those knights had heard, their harts gan earne,1 To understand that villeins dwelling place, And greatly it desir’d of her to learne, And by which way they towards it should trace.2 “Were not” (sayd she) “that it should let3 your pace Towards my Ladies presence by you ment,4 I would you guyde directly to the place.” “Then let not that” (said they) “stay your intent; For neither will one foot, till we that carle have hent.”5

8

So forth they past, till they approched ny Unto the rocke, where was the villains won,6 Which when the Damzell neare at hand did spy, She warn’d the knights thereof: who thereupon Gan to advize, what best were to be done. So both agreed, to send that mayd afore, Where she might sit nigh to the den alone, Wayling, and raysing pittifull uprore, As if she did some great calamitie deplore.

9

With noyse whereof when as the caytive carle7 Should issue forth, in hope to find some spoyle, They in awayt8 would closely him ensnarle, Ere to his den he backward could recoyle, And so would hope him easily to foyle. The Damzell straight went, as she was directed, Unto the rocke, and there upon the soyle Having her selfe in wretched wize abjected, Gan weepe and wayle, as if great griefe had her affected.

10

The cry whereof entring the hollow cave, Eftsoones brought forth the villaine, as they ment, With hope of her some wishfull boot9 to have. Full dreadfull wight he was, as ever went Upon the earth, with hollow eyes deepe pent,

1

6

2

7

earne: yearn. trace: proceed. 3 let: slow. 4 ment: intended. 5 I.e., neither will go farther until they have caught the villain.

won: dwelling. caytive carle: wretched churl. 8 in awayt: in ambush. 9 boot: booty.

Canto Nine

And long curld locks, that downe his shoulders shagged, And on his backe an uncouth vestiment Made of straunge stuffe, but all to1 worne and ragged, And underneath his breech was all to torne and jagged.2 11

And in his hand an huge long staffe he held, Whose top was arm’d with many an yron hooke, Fit to catch hold of all that he could weld,3 Or in the compasse4 of his clouches tooke; And ever round about he cast his looke. Als at his backe a great wyde net he bore, With which he seldome fished at the brooke, But usd to fish for fooles on the dry shore, Of which he in faire weather wont to take great store.5

12

Him when the damzell saw fast by her side, So ugly creature, she was nigh dismayd, And now for helpe aloud in earnest cride. But when the villaine saw her so affrayd, He gan with guilefull words her to perswade, To banish feare, and with Sardonian6 smyle Laughing on her, his false intent to shade, Gan forth to lay his bayte her to beguyle, That from her self unwares he might her steale the whyle.

13

Like as the fouler on his guilefull pype Charmes to the birds full many a pleasant lay, That they the whiles may take lesse heedie keepe,7 How he his nets doth for their ruine lay: So did the villaine to her prate and play, And many pleasant trickes before her show, To turne her eyes from his intent away: For he in slights and jugling feates did flow,8 And of legierdemayne the mysteries did know.

1

4

2

5

all to: entirely. Malengin resembles the Irish as Spenser describes them in A View (56), as Gough points out. 3 weld: overcome.

compasse: reach. See Orlando, 15.43–45. 6 Sardonian: sardonic. 7 heedie keepe: heedful care. 8 flow: overflow.

121

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14

To which whilest she lent her intentive1 mind, He suddenly his net upon her threw, That oversprad her like a puffe of wind; And snatching her soone up, ere well she knew, Ran with her fast away unto his mew,2 Crying for helpe aloud. But when as ny He came unto his cave, and there did vew The armed knights stopping his passage by, He threw his burden downe, and fast away did fly.

15

But Artegall him after did pursew, The whiles the Prince there kept the entrance still: Up to the rocke he ran, and thereon flew Like a wyld Gote, leaping from hill to hill, And dauncing on the craggy cliffes at will; That deadly daunger seem’d in all mens sight, To tempt such steps, where footing was so ill: Ne ought avayled for the armed knight, To thinke to follow him, that was so swift and light.

16

Which when he saw, his yron man he sent, To follow him; for he was swift in chace. He him pursewd, where ever that he went, Both over rockes, and hilles, and every place, Where so he fled, he followd him apace: So that he shortly forst him to forsake The hight, and downe descend unto the base. There he him courst3 a fresh, and soone did make To leave his proper forme, and other shape to take.

17

Into a Foxe himselfe he first did tourne; But he him hunted like a Foxe full fast: Then to a bush himselfe he did transforme, But he the bush did beat, till that at last Into a bird it chaung’d, and from him past, Flying from tree to tree, from wand4 to wand:

1 2

intentive: attentive. mew: den, a cage for birds.

3 4

courst: chased. wand: branch.

Canto Nine

123

But he then stones at it so long did cast, That like a stone it fell upon the land, But he then tooke it up, and held fast in his hand.1 18

So he it brought with him unto the knights, And to his Lord Sir Artegall it lent, Warning him hold it fast, for feare of slights. Who whilest in hand it gryping hard he hent,2 Into a Hedgehogge all unwares it went, And prickt him so, that he away it threw. Then gan it runne away incontinent,3 Being returned to his former hew:4 But Talus soone him overtooke, and backward drew.

19

But when as he would to a snake againe Have turn’d himselfe, he with his yron flayle Gan drive at him, with so huge might and maine, That all his bones, as small as sandy grayle5 He broke, and did his bowels disentrayle; Crying in vaine for helpe, when helpe was past. So did deceipt the selfe deceiver fayle, There they him left a carrion outcast; For beasts and foules to feede upon for their repast.

20

Thence forth they passed with that gentle Mayd, To see her Ladie, as they did agree. To which when she approched, thus she sayd; “Loe now, right noble knights, arriv’d ye bee Nigh to the place, which ye desir’d to see: There shall ye see my soverayne Lady Queene Most sacred wight, most debonayre and free, That ever yet upon this earth was seene, Or that with Diademe hath ever crowned beene.”

21

The gentle knights rejoyced much to heare The prayses of that Prince6 so manifold, And passing litle further, commen were,

1

Malengin resembles the shape-changer Proteus. See Homer, Odyssey, 4.351–93. Also see III.viii.39. 2 hent: grasped. 3 incontinent: immediately.

4

hew: shape. grayle: gravel. 6 In the Renaissance, a queen could be called a prince. 5

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

124

Where they a stately pallace did behold, Of pompous show, much more then she had told; With many towres, and tarras1 mounted hye, And all their tops bright glistering with gold, That seemed to outshine the dimmed skye, And with their brightnesse daz’d the straunge beholders eye. 22

There they alighting, by that Damzell were Directed in, and shewed all the sight: Whose porch, that most magnificke did appeare, Stood open wyde to all men day and night; Yet warded well by one of mickle might, That sate thereby, with gyantlike resemblance, To keepe out guyle, and malice, and despight, That under shew oftimes of fayned semblance, Are wont in Princes courts to worke great scath2 and hindrance.

23

His name was Awe; by whom they passing in Went up the hall, that was a large wyde roome, All full of people making troublous din, And wondrous noyse, as if that there were some, Which unto them was dealing righteous doome.3 By whom they passing, through the thickest preasse, The marshall of the hall4 to them did come; His name hight Order, who commaunding peace, Them guyded through the throng, that did their clamors ceasse.

24

They ceast their clamors upon them to gaze; Whom seeing all in armour bright as day, Straunge there to see, it did them much amaze, And with unwonted terror halfe affray. For never saw they there the like array. Ne ever was the name of warre there spoken, But joyous peace and quietnesse alway, Dealing just judgements, that mote not be broken For any brybes, or threates of any to be wroken.5

1

tarras: terraces. scath: harm. 3 doome: judgment. 2

4 The officer in charge of formal ceremony at court. 5 wroken: inflicted.

Canto Nine

25

There as they entred at the Scriene,1 they saw Some one, whose tongue was for his trespasse vyle Nayld to a post, adjudged so by law: For that therewith he falsely did revyle, And foule blaspheme that Queene for forged guyle, Both with bold speaches, which he blazed had, And with lewd poems, which he did compyle; For the bold title of a Poet bad He on himselfe had ta’en, and rayling rymes had sprad.

26

Thus there he stood, whylest high over his head, There written was the purport of his sin, In cyphers strange, that few could rightly read, BON FONS: but bon that once had written bin, Was raced2 out, and Mal was now put in. So now Malfont 3 was plainely to be red; Eyther for th’evill, which he did therein, Or that he likened was to a welhed Of evill words, and wicked sclaunders by him shed.

27

They passing by, were guyded by degree Unto the presence of that gratious Queene: Who sate on high, that she might all men see, And might of all men royally be seene, Upon a throne of gold full bright and sheene, Adorned all with gemmes of endlesse price, As either might for wealth have gotten bene, Or could be fram’d by workmans rare device; And all embost with Lyons and with Flourdelice.4

28

All over her a cloth of state was spred, Not of rich tissew, nor of cloth of gold, Nor of ought else, that may be richest red, But like a cloud, as likest may be told, That her brode spreading wings did wyde unfold;

1

A screen was used to divide large halls. raced: erased. 3 “Font” recalls the Latin word for “fountain” and the French word for “maker,” as well as the font used in printing. For consistency with “Malfont,” many editors emend 2

125

“BON FONS” to “BON FONT”—but the inconsistency of the 1596 edition matches the deeply vexed nature of writing and interpretation in this stanza. 4 The lion represents England and the fleurde-lis France, which Elizabeth claimed.

126

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Whose skirts were bordred with bright sunny beams,1 Glistring like gold, amongst the plights2 enrold, And here and there shooting forth silver streames, Mongst which crept litle Angels through the glittering gleames. 29

Seemed those litle Angels did uphold The cloth of state, and on their purpled wings Did beare the pendants, through their nimblesse3 bold: Besides a thousand more of such, as sings Hymnes to high God, and carols heavenly things, Encompassed the throne, on which she sate: She Angel-like, the heyre of ancient kings And mightie Conquerors, in royall state, Whylest kings and kesars at her feet did them prostrate.4

30

Thus she did sit in soverayne Majestie, Holding a Scepter in her royall hand, The sacred pledge of peace and clemencie, With which high God had blest her happie land, Maugre5 so many foes, which did withstand. But at her feet her sword was likewise layde, Whose long rest rusted the bright steely brand; Yet when as foes enforst, or friends sought ayde, She could it sternely draw, that all the world dismayde.6

31

And round about, before her feet there sate A bevie of faire Virgins clad in white, That goodly seem’d t’adorne her royall state, All lovely daughters of high Jove, that hight Litae, by him begot in loves delight, Upon the righteous Themis:7 those they say

1

Recalls the theophany on Sinai (Exod. 24.16–18), as Hamilton suggests.

6

2

For Elizabeth’s rusty sword, see her poem, “The Doubt of Future Foes” (Marcus, 133–34).

3

7

plights: pleats. nimblesse: nimbleness. 4 This stanza echoes Rev. 4.10, 7.11, and 15.3. 5 Maugre: despite.

The Litae are personified prayers, mediating between humans and their father Jove (Homer, Iliad, 9.498–512). The daughters of Themis and Jove are the Horae (Hesiod, Theogony, 901–903). Spenser conflates the two different figures.

Canto Nine

127

Upon Joves judgement seat wayt day and night, And when in wrath he threats the worlds decay, They doe his anger calme, and cruell vengeance stay. 32

They also doe by his divine permission Upon the thrones of mortall Princes tend, And often treat for pardon and remission To suppliants, through frayltie which offend. Those did upon Mercillaes throne attend: Just Dice, wise Eunomie, myld Eirene,1 And them amongst, her glorie to commend, Sate goodly Temperance in garments clene, And sacred Reverence, yborne of heavenly strene.2

33

Thus did she sit in royall rich estate, Admyr’d of many, honoured of all, Whylest underneath her feete, there as she sate, An huge great Lyon lay, that mote appall An hardie courage, like captived thrall, With a strong yron chaine and coller bound, That once he could not move, nor quich3 at all; Yet did he murmure with rebellions sound, And softly royne, when salvage choler4 gan redound.

34

So sitting high in dreaded soverayntie, Those two strange knights were to her presence brought; Who bowing low before her Majestie, Did to her myld obeysance,5 as they ought, And meekest boone, that they imagine mought. To whom she eke inclyning her withall, As a faire stoupe6 of her high soaring thought, A chearefull countenance on them let fall, Yet tempred with some majestie imperiall.

1 The names of the Horae, according to Hesiod, meaning justice, good government, and peace, respectively. 2 strene: strain, lineage. 3 quich: stir.

4

royne: growl; salvage choler: savage anger. 5 obeysance: homage. 6 stoupe: the swoop of a bird of prey.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

128 35

As the bright sunne, what time his fierie teme Towards the westerne brim begins to draw, Gins to abate the brightnesse of his beme, And fervour of his flames somewhat adaw:1 So did this mightie Ladie, when she saw Those two strange knights such homage to her make, Bate somewhat of that Majestie and awe, That whylome wont to doe2 so many quake, And with more myld aspect those two to entertake.

36

Now at that instant, as occasion fell, When these two stranger knights arriv’d in place, She was about affaires of common wele, Dealing of Justice with indifferent3 grace, And hearing pleas of people meane and base. Mongst which as then, there was for to be heard The tryall of a great and weightie case, Which on both sides was then debating hard: But at the sight of these,4 those were a while debard.

37

But after all her princely entertayne, To th’hearing of that former cause in hand, Her selfe eftsoones she gan convert5 againe; Which that those knights likewise mote understand, And witnesse forth aright in forrain land,6 Taking them up unto her stately throne, Where they mote heare the matter throughly scand On either part, she placed th’one on th’one, The other on the other side, and neare them none.7

38

Then was there brought, as prisoner to the barre, A Ladie of great countenance and place, But that she it with foule abuse did marre; Yet did appeare rare beautie in her face, But blotted with condition vile and base, That all her other honour did obscure,

1

adaw: subdue. doe: make. 3 indifferent: unbiased. 4 I.e., Artegall and Arthur. 2

5

convert: turn. I.e., report abroad Mercilla’s justice. 7 Artegall and Arthur are positioned alongside Mercilla to hear the case as judges. 6

Canto Nine

129

And titles of nobilitie deface: Yet in that wretched semblant,1 she did sure The peoples great compassion unto her allure.2 39

Then up arose a person of deepe reach, And rare in-sight, hard matters to revele; That well could charme his tongue, and time his speach To all assayes;3 his name was called Zele: He gan that Ladie strongly to appele4 Of many haynous crymes, by her enured,5 And with sharpe reasons rang her such a pele, That those, whom she to pitie had allured, He now t’abhorre and loath her person had procured.

40

First gan he tell, how this that seem’d so faire And royally arayd, Duessa6 hight That false Duessa, which had wrought great care,7 And mickle mischiefe unto many a knight, By her beguyled, and confounded quight: But not for those she now in question came, Though also those mote question’d be aright, But for vyld treasons, and outrageous shame, Which she against the dred Mercilla oft did frame.

41

For she whylome (as ye mote yet right well Remember) had her counsels false conspyred, With faithlesse Blandamour and Paridell,8 (Both two her paramours, both by her hyred, And both with hope of shadowes vaine inspyred.) And with them practiz’d,9 how for to depryve

1

semblant: appearance. Spenser allegorizes Mary, Queen of Scots, who was at times able to win a great deal of public sympathy. See McCabe and Introduction, 8. 3 assayes: proofs. 4 appele: accuse. 5 enured: committed. 6 Duessa embodies falsehood and doubleness, from the Italian for “two.” She villain2

ously traps knights with her false appearances throughout The Faerie Queene. Here Spenser transforms her into a figure for Mary. See Introduction, 10. 7 care: trouble. 8 Debased and contentious knights who ally with Duessa in Book Four. Here accused of plotting against Mercilla, as certain noblemen plotted with Mary against Elizabeth. 9 practiz’d: plotted.

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Mercilla of her crowne, by her aspyred, That she might it unto her selfe deryve, And tryumph in their blood, whom she to death did dryve. 42

But through high heavens grace, which favour not The wicked driftes of trayterous desynes, Gainst loiall Princes, all this cursed plot, Ere proofe1 it tooke, discovered was betymes, And th’actours won the meede2 meet for their crymes. Such be the meede of all, that by such mene Unto the type3 of kingdomes title clymes. But false Duessa now untitled Queene,4 Was brought to her sad doome, as here was to be seene.

43

Strongly did Zele her haynous fact5 enforce, And many other crimes of foule defame Against her brought, to banish all remorse, And aggravate the horror of her blame. And with him to make part against her, came Many grave persons, that against her pled; First was a sage old Syre, that had to name The Kingdomes care, with a white silver hed, That many high regards6 and reasons gainst her red.

44

Then gan Authority her to appose7 With peremptorie powre, that made all mute; And then the law of Nations gainst her rose, And reasons brought, that no man could refute; Next gan Religion gainst her to impute High Gods beheast, and powre of holy lawes; Then gan the Peoples cry and Commons sute, Importune care of their owne publicke cause; And lastly Justice charged her with breach of lawes.

1

5

2

6

proofe: effect. meede: reward. 3 type: highest. 4 Mary abdicated the Scottish crown in 1567.

fact: guilt. regards: considerations. 7 appose: examine.

Canto Nine

45

But then for her, on the contrarie part, Rose many advocates for her to plead: First there came Pittie, with full tender hart, And with her joyn’d Regard of womanhead; And then came Daunger threatning hidden dread, And high alliance unto forren powre;1 Then came Nobilitie of birth, that bread Great ruth through her misfortunes tragicke stowre; And lastly Griefe did plead, and many teares forth powre.

46

With the neare touch whereof in tender hart The Briton Prince was sore empassionate, And woxe2 inclined much unto her part, Through the sad terror of so dreadfull fate, And wretched ruine of so high estate, That for great ruth his courage gan relent.3 Which when as Zele perceived to abate, He gan his earnest fervour to augment, And many fearefull objects to them to present.

47

He gan t’efforce4 the evidence anew, And new accusements to produce in place: He brought forth that old hag of hellish hew, The cursed Ate,5 brought her face to face, Who privie was, and partie in the case: She, glad of spoyle and ruinous decay, Did her appeach,6 and to her more disgrace, The plot of all her practise7 did display, And all her traynes, and all her treasons forth did lay.

48

Then brought he forth, with griesly grim aspect, Abhorred Murder, who with bloudie knyfe Yet dropping fresh in hand did her detect,8

1

The execution of Mary was a challenge to Mary’s son, James VI of Scotland, and to Spain, where she was considered heir to the crown of England. 2 woxe: grew. 3 In feeling pity (ruth) and fear (terror), Arthur reacts to Duessa as Aristotle says an audience reacts to tragedy, as Hamilton points out.

4

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t’efforce: to urge violently. Greek goddess of discord. Duessa raised her from hell (IV.i.19) and is now condemned as a result. 6 appeach: accuse. 7 practise: scheming. 8 detect: expose. Mary was suspected of complicity in the murder of her husband, Lord Darnley, in 1567. 5

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

132

And there with guiltie bloudshed charged ryfe:1 Then brought he forth Sedition, breeding stryfe In troublous wits, and mutinous uprore: Then brought he forth Incontinence of lyfe, Even foule Adulterie her face before, And lewd Impietie, that her accused sore. 49

All which when as the Prince had heard and seene, His former fancies ruth he gan repent, And from her partie2 eftsoones was drawen cleene. But Artegall with constant firme intent, For zeale of Justice was against her bent. So was she guiltie deemed of them all. Then Zele began to urge her punishment, And to their Queene for judgement loudly call, Unto Mercilla myld for Justice gainst the thrall.3

50

But she, whose Princely breast was touched nere With piteous ruth of her so wretched plight, Though plaine she saw by all, that she did heare, That she of death was guiltie found by right, Yet would not let just vengeance on her light; But rather let in stead thereof to fall Few perling drops from her faire lampes of light; The which she covering with her purple pall4 Would have the passion hid, and up arose withall.

1 2

ryfe: forcefully. partie: side.

3 4

thrall: prisoner. pall: robe.

Canto Ten Prince Arthur takes the enterprize for Belgee for to fight, Gerioneos Seneschall he slayes in Belges right.

1

Some Clarkes1 doe doubt in their devicefull art, Whether this heavenly thing, whereof I treat, To weeten Mercie be of Justice part, Or drawne forth from her by divine extreate.2 This well I wote, that sure she is as great, And meriteth to have as high a place, Sith in th’Almighties everlasting seat3 She first was bred, and borne of heavenly race; From thence pour’d down on men, by influence of grace.

2

For if that Vertue be of so great might, Which from just verdict will for nothing start,4 But to preserve inviolated right, Oft spilles5 the principall, to save the part; So much more then is that of powre and art, That seekes to save the subject of her skill, Yet never doth from doome of right depart: As it is greater prayse to save, then spill, And better to reforme, then to cut off the ill.6

3

Who then can thee, Mercilla, throughly prayse, That herein doest all earthly Princes pas? What heavenly Muse shall thy great honour rayse

1

Clarkes: scholars. extreate: extraction. 3 See Exod. 25.22; Lev. 16.2; Num. 7.89; Isa. 16.5, in which God’s throne is the mercy seat. See ix.27. 4 start: flinch. 5 spilles: spoils. 2

6 Much of the language is obscure in this stanza, but the sense is probably that Justice (“that Vertue”), by sticking to the letter of the law, often secures the good of the part at the expense of the whole. The great art of mercy, or equity, lies in saving the “subject,” or the part, without departing from “doome of right”––i.e., without sacrificing the whole intent of the law.

133

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Up to the skies, whence first deriv’d it was, And now on earth it selfe enlarged has, From th’utmost brinke of the Armericke1 shore, Unto the margent of the Molucas? 2 Those Nations farre thy justice doe adore: But thine owne people do thy mercy prayse much more. 4

Much more it praysed was of those two knights; The noble Prince, and righteous Artegall, When they had seene and heard her doome a rights Against Duessa, damned by them all; But by her tempred without griefe3 or gall, Till strong constraint did her thereto enforce.4 And yet even then ruing her wilfull fall, With more then needfull naturall remorse, And yeelding the last honour to her wretched corse.

5

During all which, those knights continu’d there, Both doing and receiving curtesies, Of that great Ladie, who with goodly chere Them entertayn’d, fit for their dignities, Approving5 dayly to their noble eyes Royall examples of her mercies rare, And worthie paterns of her clemencies; Which till this day mongst many living are, Who them to their posterities doe still declare.

6

Amongst the rest, which in that space befell, There came two Springals6 of full tender yeares, Farre thence from forrein land, where they did dwell, To seeke for succour of her and of her Peares,7 With humble prayers and intreatfull teares; Sent by their mother, who a widow was,

1

Armericke: American. Also known as the Spice Islands, the Moluccas were visited by Sir Francis Drake in 1579. 3 griefe: anger. 4 Although politely not said, Duessa has her head cut off here. The adverb “thereto” indicates that “strong constraint” was applied 2

appropriately to “her.” The understatement reflects Mercilla’s reluctance, mirroring Elizabeth’s seeming reluctance to execute Mary Queen of Scots. 5 approving: demonstrating. 6 Springals: youths. 7 Peares: peers, nobles.

Canto Ten

135

Wrapt in great dolours and in deadly feares, By a strong Tyrant, who invaded has Her land, and slaine her children ruefully alas. 7

Her name was Belgae,1 who in former age A Ladie of great worth and wealth had beene, And mother of a frutefull heritage, Even seventeene goodly sonnes;2 which who had seene In their first flowre, before this fatall teene3 Them overtooke, and their faire blossomes blasted, More happie mother would her surely weene, Then famous Niobe, before she tasted Latonaes childrens wrath, that all her issue wasted.4

8

But this fell Tyrant, through his tortious5 powre, Had left her now but five of all that brood: For twelve of them he did by times devoure, And to his Idols sacrifice their blood, Whylest he of none was stopped, nor withstood. For soothly he was one of matchlesse might, Of horrible aspect, and dreadfull mood, And had three bodies in one wast empight,6 And th’armes and legs of three, to succour him in fight.

9

And sooth they say, that he was borne and bred Of Gyants race, the sonne of Geryon,7 He that whylome in Spaine so sore was dred, For his huge powre and great oppression, Which brought that land to his subjection, Through his three bodies powre, in one combynd;

1

Referring to Belgium, and the Low Countries as a whole, which were ruled by Spain and sought help from England. In 1585 Elizabeth sent an army under the rule of Leicester (represented here by Arthur), though with far worse results than Spenser’s account implies. See Introduction, 9. 2 Represents the seventeen provinces of the Low Countries. 3 teene: injury. 4 Niobe boasted of her seven sons and seven daughters until a jealous Latona or-

dered her own children, Phoebus and Diana, to kill them. See Metamorphoses, 6.146–312. 5 tortious: wrongful, illegal. 6

empight: implanted. Geryon was a triple-bodied giant who kept a herd of fierce, red cattle in Spain. They were tended by Eurytion and the two-headed dog Orthrus. Hercules’ tenth labor was to steal the cattle (Diodorus Siculus, 4.17–18). 7

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And eke all strangers in that region Arryving, to his kyne1 for food assynd; The fayrest kyne alive, but of the fiercest kynd. 10

For they were all, they say, of purple hew, Kept by a cowheard, hight Eurytion, A cruell carle, the which all strangers slew, Ne day nor night did sleepe, t’attend them on, But walkt about them ever and anone, With his two headed dogge, that Orthrus hight; Orthrus begotten by great Typhaon, And foule Echidna, in the house of night;2 But Hercules them all did overcome in fight.

11

His sonne was this, Geryoneo3 hight, Who after that his monstrous father fell Under Alcides4 club, streight tooke his flight From that sad land, where he his syre did quell, And came to this, where Belge then did dwell, And flourish in all wealth and happinesse, Being then new made widow (as befell) After her Noble husbands late decesse; Which gave beginning to her woe and wretchednesse.

12

Then this bold Tyrant, of her widowhed Taking advantage, and her yet fresh woes, Himselfe and service to her offered, Her to defend against all forrein foes, That should their powre against her right oppose. Whereof she glad, now needing strong defence, Him entertayn’d, and did her champion chose: Which long he us’d with carefull diligence, The better to confirme her fearelesse confidence.

13

By meanes whereof, she did at last commit All to his hands, and gave him soveraine powre To doe, what ever he thought good or fit.

1

kyne: cows. The fearsome Typhon and Echidna give birth to many monsters, including Orthrus. See Hesiod, Theogony, 306–309.

2

3

Geryon’s son, Geryoneo, also has three bodies. Spenser invents Geryoneo, who, in his oppression of Belge, is usually read as a figure for Philip II and the Spanish dynasty. 4 Another name for Hercules.

Canto Ten

137

Which having got, he gan forth from that howre To stirre up strife, and many a Tragicke stowre, Giving her dearest children one by one Unto a dreadfull Monster to devoure, And setting up an Idole of his owne, The image of his monstrous parent Geryone.1 14

So tyrannizing, and oppressing all, The woefull widow had no meanes now left, But unto gratious great Mercilla call For ayde, against that cruell Tyrants theft, Ere all her children he from her had reft. Therefore these two, her eldest sonnes she sent, To seeke for succour of this Ladies gieft:2 To whom their sute they humbly did present, In th’hearing of full many Knights and Ladies gent.3

15

Amongst the which then fortuned to bee The noble Briton Prince, with his brave Peare;4 Who when he none of all those knights did see Hastily bent, that enterprise to heare, Nor undertake the same, for cowheard feare, He stepped forth with courage bold and great, Admyr’d of all the rest in presence there, And humbly gan that mightie Queene entreat, To graunt him that adventure for his former feat.5

16

She gladly graunted it: then he straight way Himselfe unto his journey gan prepare, And all his armours readie dight6 that day, That nought the morrow next mote stay his fare.7 The morrow next appear’d, with purple hayre Yet dropping fresh out of the Indian fount,8

1 Geryoneo’s oppressive rule, his rituals, and his monster allegorize the Spanish Inquisition in the Netherlands. 2 gieft: gift. 3 4

gent: gentle, high born. Peare: peer––i.e., Artegall.

5 Arthur seeks an adventure as reward for his defeat of the Souldan. 6 dight: assembled. 7 fare: going. 8 I.e., the east.

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And bringing light into the heavens fayre, When he was readie to his steede to mount; Unto his way, which now was all his care and count. 17

Then taking humble leave of that great Queene, Who gave him roiall giftes and riches rare,1 As tokens of her thankefull mind beseene,2 And leaving Artegall to his owne care; Upon his voyage forth he gan to fare, With those two gentle youthes, which him did guide, And all his way before him still prepare. Ne after him did Artigall abide, But on his first adventure forward forth did ride.

18

It was not long, till that the Prince arrived Within the land, where dwelt that Ladie3 sad, Whereof that Tyrant had her now deprived, And into moores and marshes banisht had, Out of the pleasant soyle, and citties glad, In which she wont to harbour happily: But now his cruelty so sore she drad,4 That to those fennes for fastnesse5 she did fly, And there her selfe did hyde from his hard tyranny.

19

There he her found in sorrow and dismay, All solitarie without living wight; For all her other children, through affray,6 Had hid themselves, or taken further flight: And eke her selfe through sudden strange affright, When one in armes she saw, began to fly; But when her owne two sonnes she had in sight, She gan take hart, and looke up joyfully: For well she wist this knight came, succour to supply.

20

And running unto them with greedy joyes, Fell straight about their neckes, as they did kneele, And bursting forth in teares; “Ah my sweet boyes,”

1 In fact Leicester complained of

being seriously underfunded, according to Gough. 2 beseene: to be seen, probably modifying tokens.

3

I.e., Belge. drad: dreaded. 5 fastnesse: safety. 6 affray: terror. 4

Canto Ten

(Sayd she) “yet now I gin new life to feele, And feeble spirits, that gan faint and reele, Now rise againe, at this your joyous sight. Alreadie seemes that fortunes headlong wheele Begins to turne, and sunne to shine more bright, Then it was wont, through comfort of this noble knight.” 21

Then turning unto him; “And you Sir knight” (Said she) “that taken have this toylesome paine For wretched woman, miserable wight, May you in heaven immortall guerdon1 gaine For so great travell,2 as you doe sustaine: For other meede may hope for none of mee, To whom nought else, but bare life doth remaine, And that so wretched one, as ye do see Is liker lingring death, then loathed life to bee.”

22

Much was he moved with her piteous plight, And low dismounting from his loftie steede, Gan to recomfort her all that he might, Seeking to drive away deepe rooted dreede, With hope of helpe in that her greatest neede. So thence he wished her with him to wend, Unto some place, where they mote rest and feede, And she take comfort, which God now did send: Good hart in evils doth the evils much amend.

23

“Ay me” (sayd she) “and whether3 shall I goe? Are not all places full of forraine powres? My pallaces possessed of my foe, My cities sackt, and their sky-threating towres Raced, and made smooth fields now full of flowres? Onely these marishes, and myrie bogs, In which the fearefull ewftes4 do build their bowres, Yeeld me an hostry5 mongst the croking frogs, And harbour here in safety from those ravenous dogs.”

1

4

2

5

guerdon: reward. travell: travail, hardship. 3 whether: whither.

ewftes: newts. hostry: lodging.

139

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24

“Nathlesse” (said he) “deare Ladie with me goe, Some place shall us receive, and harbour yield; If not, we will it force, maugre your foe, And purchase it to us with speare and shield: And if all fayle, yet farewell open field: The earth to all her creatures lodging lends.” With such his chearefull speaches he doth wield1 Her mind so well, that to his will she bends And bynding up her locks and weeds, forth with him wends.

25

They came unto a Citie2 farre up land, The which whylome that Ladies owne had bene; But now by force extort out of her hand, By her strong foe, who had defaced cleene Her stately towres, and buildings sunny sheene; Shut up her haven,3 mard her marchants trade, Robbed her people, that full rich had beene, And in her necke a Castle huge had made,4 The which did her commaund, without needing perswade.

26

That Castle was the strength of all that state, Untill that state by strength was pulled downe, And that same citie, so now ruinate, Had bene the keye of all that kingdomes crowne; Both goodly Castle, and both goodly Towne, Till that th’offended heavens list to lowre5 Upon their blisse, and balefull fortune frowne. When those gainst states and kingdomes do conjure,6 Who then can thinke their hedlong ruine to recure.7

27

But he8 had brought it now in servile bond, And made it beare the yoke of inquisition, Stryving long time in vaine it to withstond;

1

wield: govern. Antwerp, which was sacked by the Spanish in 1585. According to Gough, “in stanzas 25–27 Spenser nearly forgets the mythical Geryoneo and Belge, and tells almost literally the story of Spanish oppression in the Netherlands.” 3 haven: harbor––the Spanish laid siege to Antwerp, closing off the river Scheldt. 2

4 I.e., in the neck or center of Antwerp’s territory––also signifying the city’s total subjection. 5 lowre: scowl. 6 conjure: conspire. 7 recure: repair, heal. 8 I.e., Geryoneo.

Canto Ten

141

Yet glad at last to make most base submission, And life enjoy for any composition.1 So now he hath new lawes and orders new Imposd on it, with many a hard condition, And forced it, the honour that is dew To God, to doe unto his Idole most untrew. 28

To him he hath, before this Castle greene, Built a faire Chappell, and an Altar framed Of costly Ivory, full rich beseene, On which that cursed Idole farre proclamed, He hath set up, and him his God hath named, Offring to him in sinfull sacrifice The flesh of men,2 to Gods owne likenesse framed, And powring forth their bloud in brutishe wize, That any yron eyes, to see it would agrize.3

29

And for more horror and more crueltie, Under that cursed Idols altar stone; An hideous monster doth in darknesse lie, Whose dreadfull shape was never seene of none That lives on earth; but unto those alone The which unto him sacrificed bee. Those he devoures, they say, both flesh and bone: What else they have, is all the Tyrants fee;4 So that no whit of them remayning one may see.

30

There eke he placed a strong garrisone, And set a Seneschall5 of dreaded might, That by his powre oppressed every one, And vanquished all ventrous knights in fight; To whom he wont shew all the shame he might, After that them in battell he had wonne. To which when now they gan approch in sight, The Ladie counseld him the place to shonne, Whereas so many knights had fouly bene fordonne.6

1 composition: terms of surrender. Most of the states signed the 1577 Union of Brussels, which upheld the authority of Philip II and the Catholic religion. 2 Gough associates the “Idole” with the

Catholic host, and the human sacrifice with the auto de fé of the Inquisition. 3 agrize: tremble in horror. 4 fee: property. 5 Seneschall: governor, judicial officer. 6 fordonne: destroyed.

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31

Her fearefull speaches nought he did regard, But ryding streight under the Castle wall, Called aloud unto the watchfull ward,1 Which there did wayte, willing them forth to call Into the field their Tyrants Seneschall. To whom when tydings thereof came, he streight Cals for his armes, and arming him withall, Eftsoones forth pricked proudly in his might, And gan with courage fierce addresse him to the fight.

32

They both encounter in the middle plaine, And their sharpe speares doe both together smite Amid their shields, with so huge might and maine, That seem’d their soules they wold have ryven2 quight Out of their breasts, with furious despight. Yet could the Seneschals3 no entrance find Into the Princes shield, where it empight;4 So pure the mettall was, and well refynd, But shivered5 all about, and scattered in the wynd.

33

Not so the Princes, but with restlesse force, Into his shield it readie passage found, Both through his haberieon,6 and eke his corse: Which tombling downe upon the senselesse ground, Gave leave unto his ghost from thraldome bound, To wander in the griesly shades of night. There did the Prince him leave in deadly swound, And thence unto the castle marched right, To see if entrance there as yet obtaine he might.

34

But as he nigher drew, three knights he spyde, All arm’d to point, issuing forth a pace, Which towards him with all their powre did ryde, And meeting him right in the middle race,7 Did all their speares attonce on him enchace.8

1

ward: guard. ryven: torn. 3 I.e., the Seneschal’s spear. 4 where it empight: where it could implant itself. Arthur’s shield is described in Book One as “Hewen out of Adamant 2

rocke,” a mythical substance as hard as diamond (I.vii.33). 5 shivered: shattered. 6 haberieon: coat of mail. 7 middle race: the middle of the field. 8 enchace: enclose.

Canto Ten

143

As three great Culverings1 for battrie bent, And leveld all against one certaine place, Doe all attonce their thunders rage forth rent, That makes the wals to stagger with astonishment. 35

So all attonce they on the Prince did thonder; Who from his saddle swarved nought asyde, Ne to their force gave way, that was great wonder, But like a bulwarke, firmely did abyde, Rebutting him, which in the midst did ryde, With so huge rigour, that his mortall speare Past through his shield, and pierst through either syde,2 That downe he fell uppon his mother deare, And powred forth his wretched life in deadly dreare.

36

Whom when his other fellowes saw, they fled As fast as feete could carry them away; And after them the Prince as swiftly sped, To be aveng’d of their unknightly play. There whilest they entring, th’one did th’other stay, The hindmost in the gate he overhent,3 And as he pressed in, him there did slay: His carkasse tumbling on the threshold, sent His groning soule unto her place of punishment.

37

The other which was entred, laboured fast To sperre4 the gate; but that same lumpe of clay, Whose grudging ghost was thereout fled and past; Right in the middest of the threshold lay, That it the Posterne5 did from closing stay: The whiles the Prince hard preased in betweene, And entraunce wonne. Streight th’other fled away, And ran into the Hall, where he did weene Him selfe to save: but he there slew him at the skreene.6

1

4

2

5

Culverings: large cannons. Arthur’s spear goes through the knight’s shield and his body, piercing both his sides. 3 overhent: overtook.

sperre: bolt. Posterne: back or side door. 6 Screens were commonly used as partitions in great halls.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

144 38

Then all the rest which in that Castle were, Seeing that sad ensample them before, Durst not abide, but fled away for feare, And them convayd out at a Posterne dore. Long sought the Prince, but when he found no more T’oppose against his powre, he forth issued Unto that Lady, where he her had lore,1 And her gan cheare, with what she there had vewed, And what she had not seene, within unto her shewed.

39

Who with right humble thankes him goodly greeting, For so great prowesse, as he there had proved, Much greater then was ever in her weeting,2 With great admiraunce inwardly was moved, And honourd him, with all that her behoved. Thenceforth into that Castle he her led, With her two sonnes, right deare of her beloved, Where all that night them selves they cherished, And from her balefull minde all care he banished.

1

lore: left.

2

weeting: knowledge.

Canto Eleven Prince Arthure overcomes the great Gerioneo in fight: Doth slay the Monster, and restore Belge unto her right.

1

It often fals in course of common life, That right long time is overborne of wrong, Through avarice, or powre, or guile, or strife, That weakens her, and makes her party1 strong: But Justice, though her dome2 she doe prolong, Yet at the last she will her owne cause right. As by sad Belge seemes, whose wrongs though long She suffred, yet at length she did requight, And sent redresse thereof by this brave Briton Knight.

2

Whereof when newes was to that Tyrant brought, How that the Lady Belge now had found A Champion, that had with his Champion fought, And laid his Seneschall low on the ground, And eke him selfe did threaten to confound, He gan to burne in rage, and friese in feare, Doubting sad end of principle3 unsound: Yet sith he heard but one, that did appeare, He did him selfe encourage, and take better cheare.

3

Nathelesse him selfe he armed all in hast, And forth he far’d with all his many4 bad, Ne stayed step, till that he came at last Unto the Castle, which they conquerd had. There with huge terrour, to be more ydrad, He sternely marcht before the Castle gate,

1 2

her party: the opposition party. dome: doom, judgment.

3

doubting: fearing; principle: beginning, initial state. 4 many: company.

145

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And with bold vaunts, and ydle threatning bad1 Deliver him his owne, ere yet too late, To which they had no right, nor any wrongfull state.2 4

The Prince staid not his aunswere to devize, But opening streight the Sparre,3 forth to him came, Full nobly mounted in right warlike wize; And asked him, if that he were the same, Who all that wrong unto that wofull Dame So long had done, and from her native land Exiled her, that all the world spake shame. He boldly aunswerd him, he there did stand That would his doings justifie with his owne hand.

5

With that so furiously at him he flew, As if he would have overrun him streight, And with his huge great yron axe gan hew So hideously uppon his armour bright, As he to peeces would have chopt it quight: That the bold Prince was forced foote to give4 To his first rage, and yeeld to his despight; The whilest at him so dreadfully he drive, That seem’d a marble rocke asunder could have rive.

6

Thereto a great advauntage eke he has Through his three double hands thrise multiplyde, Besides the double strength, which in them was: For stil when fit occasion did betyde, He could his weapon shift from side to syde, From hand to hand, and with such nimblesse5 sly Could wield about, that ere it were espide, The wicked stroke did wound his enemy, Behinde, beside, before, as he it list apply.

7

Which uncouth6 use when as the Prince perceived, He gan to watch the wielding of his hand, Least by such slight he were unwares deceived;

1

4

2

5

bad: bade. nor any wrongfull state: nor any (but a) wrongful claim. 3 Sparre: the bolt of the gate.

I.e., to give ground. nimblesse: nimbleness. 6 uncouth: unfamiliar, marvelous.

Canto Eleven

147

And ever ere he saw the stroke to land, He would it meete, and warily withstand. One time, when he his weapon faynd1 to shift, As he was wont, and chang’d from hand to hand, He met him with a counterstroke so swift, That quite smit off his arme, as he it up did lift. 8

Therewith, all fraught with fury and disdaine, He brayd aloud for very fell despight, And sodainely t’avenge him selfe againe, Gan into one assemble all the might Of all his hands, and heaved them on hight, Thinking to pay him with that one for all: But the sad steele seizd not, where it was hight,2 Uppon the childe,3 but somewhat short did fall, And lighting on his horses head, him quite did mall.4

9

Downe streight to ground fell his astonisht steed, And eke to th’earth his burden with him bare: But he him selfe full lightly from him freed, And gan him selfe to fight on foote prepare. Whereof when as the Gyant was aware, He wox right blyth, as he had got thereby,5 And laught so loud, that all his teeth wide bare One might have seene enraung’d disorderly, Like to a rancke of piles,6 that pitched are awry.

10

Eftsoones againe his axe he raught7 on hie, Ere he were throughly buckled to his geare,8 And can9 let drive at him so dreadfullie, That had he chaunced not his shield to reare, Ere that huge stroke arrived on him neare, He had him surely cloven quite in twaine.

1

6

2

7

faynd: contrived, sought. sad: heavy; hight: directed. 3 I.e., Arthur, as in viii.32.1. 4 mall: maul, batter. 5 He grew merry, as though he had won.

rancke of piles: row of stakes. raught: raised. 8 I.e., before Arthur had thoroughly prepared. 9 can: began to.

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But th’Adamantine shield, which he did beare, So well was tempred, that for all his maine,1 It would no passage yeeld unto his purpose vaine. 11

Yet was the stroke so forcibly applide, That made him stagger with uncertaine sway, As if he would have tottered to one side. Wherewith full wroth, he fiercely gan assay,2 That curt’sie with like kindnesse to repay; And smote at him with so importune3 might, That two more of his armes did fall away, Like fruitlesse braunches, which the hatchets slight4 Hath pruned from the native tree, and cropped quight.

12

With that all mad and furious he grew, Like a fell mastiffe through enraging heat, And curst, and band,5 and blasphemies forth threw, Against his Gods, and fire to them did threat, And hell unto him selfe with horrour great. Thenceforth he car’d no more, which way he strooke, Nor where it light, but gan to chaufe6 and sweat, And gnasht his teeth, and his head at him shooke, And sternely him beheld with grim and ghastly looke.

13

Nought fear’d the childe his lookes, ne yet his threats, But onely wexed7 now the more aware, To save him selfe from those his furious heats, And watch advauntage, how to worke his care:8 The which good Fortune to him offred faire. For as he in his rage him overstrooke,9 He ere he could his weapon backe repaire, His side all bare and naked overtooke,10 And with his mortal steel quite throgh the body strooke.

1

6

2

7

maine: strength. assay: attempt. 3 importune: heavy, grievous. 4 slight: dexterity. 5 band: swore.

chaufe: chafe. wexed: grew. 8 care: trouble, suffering. 9 overstrooke: overswung. 10 Arthur catches Geryoneo’s exposed side.

Canto Eleven

14

Through all three bodies he him strooke attonce; That all the three attonce fell on the plaine: Else should he thrise have needed, for the nonce1 Them to have stricken, and thrise to have slaine. So now all three one sencelesse lumpe remaine, Enwallow’d in his owne blacke bloudy gore, And byting th’earth for very deaths disdaine; Who with a cloud of night him covering, bore Downe to the house of dole,2 his daies there to deplore.

15

Which when the Lady from the Castle saw, Where she with her two sonnes did looking stand, She towards him in hast her selfe did draw, To greet3 him the good fortune of his hand: And all the people both of towne and land, Which there stood gazing from the Citties wall Uppon these warriours, greedy4 t’understand, To whether5 should victory befall, Now when they saw it falne, they eke him greeted all.

16

But Belge with her sonnes prostrated low Before his feete, in all that peoples sight; Mongst joyes mixing some tears, mongst wele,6 some wo, Him thus bespake; “O most redoubted Knight, The which hast me, of all most wretched wight, That earst was dead, restor’d to life againe, And these weake impes7 replanted by thy might; What guerdon8 can I give thee for thy paine, But even that which thou savedst, thine still to remaine?”9

17

He tooke her up forby10 the lilly hand, And her recomforted the best he might, Saying; “Deare Lady, deedes ought not be scand11

1

for the nonce: for the purpose. dole: suffering. 3 greet: congratulate. 4 greedy: desirous. 5 whether: which. 6 wele: happiness. 2

149

7 impes: young shoot of a plant, offspring––i.e., the two sons. 8 guerdon: reward. 9 Belge offers Arthur sovereignty over her land. 10 forby: by. 11 scand: judged.

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By th’authors manhood, nor the doers might, But by their trueth and by the causes right: That same is it, which fought for you this day.1 What other meed then need me to requight, But that which yeeldeth vertues meed alway? That is the vertue selfe, which her reward doth pay.”2 18

She humbly thankt him for that wondrous grace, And further sayd; “Ah Sir, but mote ye please, Sith ye thus farre have tendred my poore case, As from my chiefest foe me to release, That your victorious arme will not yet cease, Till ye have rooted all the relickes3 out Of that vilde race, and stablished my peace.” “What is there else” (sayd he) “left of their rout? Declare it boldly Dame, and doe not stand in dout.”

19

“Then wote you, Sir, that in this Church hereby, There stands an Idole of great note and name, The which this Gyant reared first on hie, And of his owne vaine fancies thought did frame: To whom for endlesse horrour of his shame, He offred up for daily sacrifize My children and my people, burnt in flame;4 With all the tortures, that he could devize, The more t’aggrate his God with such his blouddy guize.5

20

And underneath this Idoll there doth lie An hideous monster, that doth it defend, And feedes on all the carkasses, that die In sacrifize unto that cursed feend: Whose ugly shape none ever saw, nor kend,6 That ever scap’d: for of a man they say

1

I.e., truth and right, more than Arthur’s physical heroism, should get credit for fighting. 2 Arthur turns down Belge’s offer of sovereignty, unlike Leicester, who in 1586 angered Elizabeth by accepting the title of Governor-General.

3

“Relic” is a charged word, given its association with Catholic worship. 4 Resembles Molech (2 Kings 23.10; Ps. 106.37–38). 5 t’aggrate: to gratify; guize: custom. 6 kend: knew.

Canto Eleven

151

It has the voice, that speaches forth doth send, Even blasphemous words, which she doth bray Out of her poysnous entrails, fraught with dire decay.”1 21

Which when the Prince heard tell, his heart gan earne2 For great desire, that Monster to assay, And prayd the place of her abode to learne. Which being shew’d, he gan him selfe streight way Thereto addresse, and his bright shield display. So to the Church he came, where it was told, The Monster underneath the Altar lay; There he that Idoll saw of massy gold Most richly made, but there no Monster did behold.

22

Upon the Image with his naked blade Three times, as in defiance, there he strooke; And the third time out of an hidden shade, There forth issewd, from under th’Altars smooke, A dreadfull feend, with fowle deformed looke, That stretcht it selfe, as it had long lyen still; And her long taile and fethers strongly shooke, That all the Temple did with terrour fill; Yet him nought terrifide, that feared nothing ill.

23

An huge great Beast it was, when it in length Was stretched forth, that nigh fild all the place, And seem’d to be of infinite great strength; Horrible, hideous, and of hellish race, Borne of the brooding of Echidna3 base, Or other like infernall furies kinde: For of a Mayd she had the outward face, To hide the horrour, which did lurke behinde, The better to beguile, whom she so fond4 did finde.

1

In Spenser’s previous mention, Geryoneo’s monster is male (x.29). 2 earne: yearn. 3 The monsters Echidna and Typhon gave birth to the Sphinx, whom Geryoneo’s mon-

ster resembles. See Apollodorus 3.5.8–9. In x.10, Geryoneo is linked to Orthrus, another of Echidna’s offspring. 4 fond: foolish.

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24

Thereto the body of a dog she had, Full of fell ravin1 and fierce greedinesse; A Lions clawes, with powre and rigour clad, To rend and teare, what so she can oppresse; A Dragons taile, whose sting without redresse Full deadly wounds, where so it is empight;2 And Eagles wings, for scope and speedinesse, That nothing may escape her reaching might, Whereto she ever list to make her hardy flight.

25

Much like in foulnesse and deformity Unto that Monster, whom the Theban Knight,3 The father of that fatall progeny, Made kill her selfe for very hearts despight, That he had red her Riddle, which no wight Could ever loose, but suffred deadly doole.4 So also did this Monster use like slight To many a one, which came unto her schoole,5 Whom she did put to death, deceived like a foole.

26

She comming forth, when as she first beheld The armed Prince, with shield so blazing bright, Her ready to assaile, was greatly queld, And much dismayd with that dismayfull sight, That backe she would have turnd for great affright. But he gan her with courage fierce assay, That forst her turne againe in her despight, To save her selfe, least that he did her slay: And sure he had her slaine, had she not turnd her way.

27

Tho when she saw, that she was forst to fight, She flew at him, like to an hellish feend, And on his shield tooke hold with all her might, As if that it she would in peeces rend,

1

ravin: the act of preying upon, gluttony. empight: implanted. This is one of many similarities with the figure of Errour from Book One (I.i.13–26). 3 Oedipus, who solved the Sphinx’s riddle, causing her to kill herself. Oedipus’s children, his “fatall progeny,” inherited the curse against his house. 2

4 loose: solve; deadly doole: sorrow of death. The Sphinx killed anyone who could not solve the riddle. 5 Hamilton suggests that “schoole” refers to inquisitors who punished a false answer with death.

Canto Eleven

Or reave out of the hand, that did it hend.1 Strongly he strove out of her greedy gripe To loose his shield, and long while did contend: But when he could not quite it, with one stripe2 Her Lions clawes he from her feete away did wipe. 28

With that aloude she gan to bray and yell, And fowle blasphemous speaches forth did cast, And bitter curses, horrible to tell, That even the Temple, wherein she was plast, Did quake to heare, and nigh asunder brast.3 Tho with her huge long taile she at him strooke, That made him stagger, and stand halfe agast With trembling joynts, as he for terrour shooke; Who nought was terrifide, but greater courage tooke.

29

As when the Mast of some well timbred hulke4 Is with the blast of some outragious storme Blowne downe, it shakes the bottome of the bulke,5 And makes her ribs to cracke, as they were torne, Whilest still she stands as stonisht and forlorne: So was he stound6 with stroke of her huge taile. But ere that it she backe againe had borne, He with his sword it strooke, that without faile He joynted7 it, and mard the swinging of her flaile.

30

Then gan she cry much louder then afore, That all the people there without it heard, And Belge selfe was therewith stonied8 sore, As if the onely sound thereof she feard. But then the feend her selfe more fiercely reard Uppon her wide great wings, and strongly flew With all her body at his head and beard, That had he not foreseene with heedfull vew, And thrown his shield atween, she had him done to rew.

1

5

2

6

reave: snatch; hend: hold. quite: quit, free; stripe: swipe. 3 brast: burst. 4 hulke: a large ship.

bulke: hull. stound: stunned. 7 joynted: disjointed, cut off. 8 stonied: astonished.

153

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31

But as she prest on him with heavy sway,1 Under her wombe his fatall sword he thrust, And for her entrailes made an open way, To issue forth; the which once being brust, Like to a great Mill damb forth fiercely gusht, And powred out of her infernall sinke2 Most ugly filth, and poyson therewith rusht, That him nigh choked with the deadly stinke: Such loathly matter were small lust3 to speake, or thinke.

32

Then downe to ground fell that deformed Masse,4 Breathing out clouds of sulphure fowle and blacke, In which a puddle of contagion was, More loathd then Lerna,5 or then Stygian lake, That any man would nigh awhaped6 make. Whom when he saw on ground, he was full glad, And streight went forth his gladnesse to partake With Belge, who watcht all this while full sad, Wayting what end would be of that same daunger drad.

33

Whom when she saw so joyously come forth, She gan rejoyce, and shew triumphant chere, Lauding and praysing his renowmed worth, By all the names that honorable were. Then in he brought her, and her shewed there The present of his paines, that Monsters spoyle,7 And eke that Idoll deem’d so costly dere; Whom he did all to peeces breake and foyle8 In filthy durt, and left so in the loathely soyle.

34

Then all the people, which beheld that day, Gan shout aloud, that unto heaven it rong; And all the damzels of that towne in ray,9 Came dauncing forth, and joyous carrols song: So him they led through all their streetes along,

1

6

2

7

sway: force. sinke: organs of digestion and excretion. 3 lust: pleasure. 4 Punning on the Catholic Mass. 5 A swamp where Hercules killed the Hydra.

awhaped: stupefied. present: visible result; spoyle: remains. 8 foyle: defile. Arthur’s iconoclasm reflects an important Protestant response to Catholic practice. 9

ray: array.

Canto Eleven

Crowned with girlonds of immortall baies,1 And all the vulgar did about them throng, To see the man, whose everlasting praise They all were bound to all posterities to raise. 35

There he with Belgae did a while remaine, Making great feast and joyous merriment, Untill he had her settled in her raine, With safe assuraunce and establishment. Then to his first emprize2 his mind he lent, Full loath to Belgae, and to all the rest: Of whom yet taking leave, thenceforth he went And to his former journey him addrest, On which long way he rode, ne ever day did rest.

36

But turne we now to noble Artegall; Who having left Mercilla, streight way went On his first quest, the which him forth did call, To weet to worke Irenaes franchisement,3 And eke Grantortoes worthy punishment. So forth he fared as his manner was, With onely Talus wayting4 diligent, Through many perils and much way did pas, Till nigh unto the place at length approcht he has.

37

There as he traveld by the way, he met An aged wight, wayfaring all alone, Who through his yeares long since aside had set The use of armes, and battell quite forgone: To whom as he approcht, he knew anone, That it was he which whilome did attend On faire Irene in her affliction, When first to Faery court he saw her wend, Unto his soveraine Queene her suite for to commend.

1

3

2

4

Garlands of bay leaves signify victory. emprize: quest. Arthur returns to his search for Gloriana, and will be seen next in Book Six.

franchisement: liberation. wayting: attending.

155

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38

Whom by his name saluting, thus he gan; “Haile good Sir Sergis,1 truest Knight alive, Well tride in all thy Ladies troubles than,2 When her that Tyrant did of Crowne deprive; What new ocasion doth thee hither drive, Whiles she alone is left, and thou here found? Or is she thrall, or doth she not survive?” To whom he thus; “She liveth sure and sound; But by that Tyrant is in wretched thraldome bound.

39

“For she presuming on th’appointed tyde,3 In which ye promist, as ye were a Knight, To meete her at the salvage4 Ilands syde, And then and there for triall of her right With her unrigteous enemy to fight, Did thither come, where she afrayd of nought, By guilefull treason and by subtill slight Surprized was, and to Grantorto brought, Who her imprisond hath, and her life often sought.

40

“And now he hath to her prefixt a day, By which if that no champion doe appeare, Which will her cause in battailous array Against him justifie, and prove her cleare Of all those crimes, that he gainst her doth reare She death shall by.”5 Those tidings sad Did much abash Sir Artegall to heare, And grieved sore, that through his fault she had Fallen into that Tyrants hand and usage bad.

41

Then thus replide; “Now sure and by my life, Too much am I too blame for that faire Maide, That have her drawne to all this troublous strife, Through promise to afford her timely aide,

1

Suggests “sergeant,” a knight in attendance to a ruler, and an officer who summons persons to court. Gough argues that Sergis allegorizes Sir Henry Sidney, father of Sir Philip, who was Lord Deputy of Ireland before Grey (302–303).

2

than: then. tyde: point in time. 4 salvage: savage. A key reference to Ireland. See Introduction, 3. 5 by: buy––i.e., suffer. 3

Canto Eleven

157

Which by default I have not yet defraide.1 But witnesse unto me, ye heavens, that know How cleare I am from blame of this upbraide: For ye into like thraldome me did throw, And kept from complishing the faith, which I did owe.2 42

“But now aread,3 Sir Sergis, how long space, Hath he her lent, a Champion to provide.” “Ten daies” (quoth he) “he graunted hath of grace, For that he weeneth well, before that tide None can have tidings to assist her side. For all the shores, which to the sea accoste,4 He day and night doth ward both far and wide, That none can there arrive without an hoste:5 So her he deemes already but a damned ghoste.”

43

“Now turne againe” (Sir Artegall then sayd) “For if I live till those ten daies have end, Assure your selfe, Sir Knight, she shall have ayd, Though I this dearest life for her doe spend”; So backeward he attone6 with him did wend. Tho as they rode together on their way, A rout of people they before them kend,7 Flocking together in confusde array, As if that there were some tumultuous affray.8

44

To which as they approcht, the cause to know, They saw a Knight in daungerous distresse Of a rude rout him chasing to and fro, That sought with lawlesse powre him to oppresse, And bring in bondage of their brutishnesse: And farre away, amid their rakehell9 bands,

1

defraide: paid––i.e., met the obligation of the promise. 2 Artegall flatly contradicts himself in this stanza, first taking blame and then deflecting it onto the heavens. Cf. iv.28. This may reflect Artegall’s ambivalent guilt about his encounter with Radigund, which delayed him, as well as Spenser’s ambivalence toward the vacillations of English policy in Ireland. 3 aread: declare.

4

accoste: border. hoste: army. 6 attone: together. 7 kend: saw. 8 affray: disturbance. This begins the episode of Burbon, which Spenser probably first intended for Canto Twelve––it is mistakenly included in the argument there. 9 rakehell: rascal. 5

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

158

They spide a Lady left all succourlesse, Crying, and holding up her wretched hands To him for aide, who long in vaine their rage withstands. 45

Yet still he strives, ne any perill spares, To reskue her from their rude violence, And like a Lion wood1 amongst them fares, Dealing his dreadfull blowes with large dispence, Gainst which the pallid death findes no defence. But all in vaine, their numbers are so great, That naught may boot to banishe them from thence: For soone as he their outrage backe doth beat, They turne afresh, and oft renew their former threat.

46

And now they doe so sharpely him assay, That they his shield in peeces battred have, And forced him to throw it quite away, Fro dangers dread his doubtfull life to save; Albe that it most safety to him gave, And much did magnifie his noble name. For from the day that he thus did it leave, Amongst all Knights he blotted was with blame, And counted but a recreant Knight, with endles shame.

47

Whom when they thus distressed did behold, They drew unto his aide; but that rude rout Them also gan assaile with outrage bold, And forced them, how ever strong and stout They were, as well approv’d in many a doubt,2 Backe to recule;3 untill that yron man With his huge flaile began to lay about, From whose sterne presence they diffused ran, Like scattred chaffe, the which the wind away doth fan.4

48

So when that Knight from perill cleare was freed, He drawing neare, began to greete them faire, And yeeld great thankes for their so goodly deed, In saving him from daungerous despaire

1 2

wood: raging. doubt: danger.

3 4

recule: recoil. See Isa. 41.15–16.

Canto Eleven

Of those, which sought his life for to empaire. Of whom Sir Artegall gan then enquire The whole occasion of his late misfare,1 And who he was, and what those villaines were, The which with mortall malice him pursu’d so nere. 49

To whom he thus; “My name is Burbon2 hight, Well knowne, and far renowmed heretofore, Untill late mischiefe did uppon me light, That all my former praise hath blemisht sore; And that faire Lady, which in that uprore Ye with those caytives saw, Flourdelis3 hight, Is mine owne love, though me she have forlore,4 Whether withheld from me by wrongfull might, Or with her owne good will, I cannot read aright.

50

“But sure to me her faith she first did plight, To be my love, and take me for her Lord, Till that a Tyrant, which Grandtorto hight, With golden giftes and many a guilefull word Entyced her, to him for to accord. O who may not with gifts and words be tempted? Sith which she hath me ever since abhord, And to my foe hath guilefully consented: Ay me, that ever guyle in wemen was invented.5

51

“And now he hath this troupe of villains sent, By open force to fetch her quite away: Gainst whom my selfe I long in vaine have bent,6 To rescue her, and daily meanes assay, Yet rescue her thence by no meanes I may: For they doe me with multitude oppresse, And with unequall might doe overlay,7 That oft I driven am to great distresse, And forced to forgoe th’attempt remedilesse.”8

1

4

2

5

misfare: misfortune. The name alludes to Henri de Burbon, King of Navarre, later Henri IV of France. See Introduction, 9. 3 As the heraldic device of the French monarchy, suggests France or Paris.

forlore: forsaken. invented: discovered. 6 bent: contended. 7 overlay: overwhelm. 8 remedilesse: without hope.

159

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52

“But why have ye” (said Artegall) “forborne Your owne good shield in daungerous dismay? That is the greatest shame and foulest scorne, Which unto any knight behappen may To loose the badge, that should his deedes display.”1 To whom Sir Burbon, blushing halfe for shame, “That shall I unto you” (quoth he) “bewray; Least ye therefore mote happily2 me blame, And deeme it doen of will, that through inforcement came.

53

“True is, that I at first was dubbed knight By a good knight, the knight of the Redcrosse;3 Who when he gave me armes, in field to fight, Gave me a shield, in which he did endosse4 His deare Redeemers badge upon the bosse:5 The same longwhile I bore, and therewithall Fought many battels without wound or losse; Therewith Grandtorto selfe I did appall, And made him oftentimes in field before me fall.

54

“But for that6 many did that shield envie, And cruell enemies increased more; To stint all strife and troublous enmitie, That bloudie scutchin7 being battered sore, I layd aside, and have of late forbore, Hoping thereby to have my love obtayned: Yet can I not my love have nathemore; For she by force is still fro me detayned, And with corruptfull brybes is to untruth mis-trayned.”8

1

Burbon abandons his shield in stanza 46. In giving up his shield, he parallels Henry IV, who in 1593 renounced the Protestant faith for political purposes. For the shield, see Eph. 6.16. However, cf. Artegall’s fight against Grantorto (xii.22). 2 happily: by chance. 3 The Knight of Holiness, the hero of Book One. His conferring knighthood on

Burbon alludes to the Protestant baptism and education of Henry IV. 4 endosse: inscribe. 5 bosse: the center of the shield. Redcrosse has given him a shield emblazoned with a cross. 6 for that: since. 7 scutchin: a shield with a coat of arms. 8 mis-trayned: misled.

Canto Eleven

55

To whom thus Artegall; “Certes Sir knight, Hard is the case, the which ye doe complaine; Yet not so hard (for nought so hard may light,1 That it to such a streight mote you constraine) As to abandon, that which doth containe Your honours stile,2 that is your warlike shield. All perill ought be lesse, and lesse all paine Then losse of fame in disaventrous field;3 Dye rather, then doe ought, that mote dishonour yield.”

56

“Not so;” (quoth he) “for yet when time doth serve, My former shield I may resume againe: To temporize is not from truth to swerve, Ne for advantage terme to entertaine, When as necessitie doth it constraine.”4 “Fie on such forgerie” (said Artegall) “Under one hood to shadow faces twaine. Knights ought be true, and truth is one in all: Of all things to dissemble fouly may befall.”5

57

“Yet let me you of courtesie request,” (Said Burbon) “to assist me now at need Against these pesants, which have me opprest, And forced me to so infamous deed, That yet my love may from their hands be freed.” Sir Artegall, albe he earst did wyte6 His wavering mind, yet to his aide agreed, And buckling him eftsoones unto the fight, Did set upon those troupes with all his powre and might.

58

Who flocking round about them, as a swarme Of flyes upon a birchen bough doth cluster, Did them assault with terrible allarme,

1

light: happen. stile: title, inscription, style. 3 disaventrous field: disastrous fight. 4 Burbon argues against the charge that he is a time-server and that he has temporized ––i.e., that he shapes his faith to the de2

161

mands of the moment. From a puritan perspective, policies of compromise and expediency in matters of faith were horrifying. 5 I.e., above all sins may misfortune befall dissembling. 6 earst did wyte: lately blamed (Burbon’s wavering mind).

162

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

And over all the fields themselves did muster, With bils and glayves making a dreadfull luster;1 That forst at first those knights backe to retyre: As when the wrathfull Boreas 2 doth bluster, Nought may abide the tempest of his yre, Both man and beast doe fly, and succour doe inquyre.3 59

But when as overblowen was that brunt, Those knights began a fresh them to assayle, And all about the fields like Squirrels hunt; But chiefly Talus with his yron flayle, Gainst which no flight nor rescue mote avayle, Made cruell havocke of the baser crew, And chaced them both over hill and dale: The raskall manie soone they4 overthrew, But the two knights5 themselves their captains did subdew.

60

At last they came whereas that Ladie bode,6 Whom now her keepers had forsaken quight, To save themselves, and scattered were abrode: Her halfe dismayd they found in doubtfull plight, As neither glad nor sorie for their sight; Yet wondrous faire she was, and richly clad In roiall robes, and many Jewels dight,7 But that those villens through their usage bad Them fouly rent, and shamefully defaced had.

61

But Burbon streight dismounting from his steed, Unto her ran with greedie great desyre, And catching her fast by her ragged weed, Would have embraced her with hart entyre. But she backstarting with disdainefull yre, Bad him avaunt,8 ne would unto his lore

1 bils and glayves: spearlike weapons; luster: shining, magnificence. 2 Boreas: the north wind. 3 inquyre: seek. 4 Possibly should be read as “he,” implying Talus alone.

5

I.e., Artegall and Burbon. bode: abode, dwelt. 7 dight: dressed. 8 avaunt: be off, depart. 6

Canto Eleven

163

Allured be, for prayer nor for meed.1 Whom when those knights so forward and forlore2 Beheld, they her rebuked and upbrayded sore. 62

Sayd Artegall; “what foule disgrace is this, To so faire Ladie, as ye seeme in sight, To blot your beautie, that unblemisht is, With so foule blame, as breach of faith once plight, Or change of love for any worlds delight? Is ought on earth so pretious or deare, As prayse and honour? Or is ought so bright And beautifull, as glories beames appeare, Whose goodly light then Phebus lampe doth shine more cleare?3

63

“Why then will ye, fond4 Dame, attempted bee Unto a strangers love, so lightly placed, For guiftes of gold, or any worldly glee,5 To leave the love, that ye before embraced, And let your fame with falshood be defaced. Fie on the pelfe,6 for which good name is sold, And honour with indignitie debased: Dearer is love then life, and fame then gold; But dearer then them both, your faith once plighted hold.”

64

Much was the Ladie in her gentle mind Abasht at his rebuke, that bit her neare, Ne ought to answere thereunto did find; But hanging downe her head with heavie cheare, Stood long amaz’d, as she amated7 weare. Which Burbon seeing, her againe assayd, And clasping twixt his armes, her up did reare Upon his steede, whiles she no whit gainesayd, So bore her quite away, nor well nor ill apayd.8

1

A departure from the rhyme scheme: as the b rhyme, this should rhyme with “yre.” “Hyre” has been proposed. 2 forlore: morally lost. 3

I.e., glory, whose light shines more clearly than Phoebus’.

4

fond: foolish. glee: entertainment, mirth, glitter. 6 pelfe: riches. 7 amated: confounded. 8 apayd: pleased. 5

164 65

1 2

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

Nathlesse the yron man did still pursew That raskall many with unpittied spoyle,1 Ne ceassed not, till all their scattred crew Into the sea he drove quite from that soyle, The which they troubled had with great turmoyle. But Artegall seeing his cruell deed, Commaunded him from slaughter to recoyle, And to his voyage gan againe proceed: For that the terme2 approching fast, required speed.

spoyle: destruction. Grantorto has given a term of ten days for

a champion to appear to support Irena (xi.42).

Canto Twelve Artegall doth Sir Burbon aide, And blames for changing shield: He with the great Grantorto fights, And slaieth him in field.

1

O sacred1 hunger of ambitious mindes, And impotent2 desire of men to raine, Whom neither dread of God, that devils bindes, Nor lawes of men, that common weales3 containe, Nor bands of nature, that wilde beastes restraine, Can keepe from outrage, and from doing wrong, Where they may hope a kingdome to obtaine. No faith so firme, no trust can be so strong, No love so lasting then, that may endure long.

2

Witnesse may Burbon be, whom all the bands, Which may a Knight assure, had surely bound, Untill the love of Lordship and of lands Made him become most faithlesse and unsound: And witnesse be Gerioneo found, Who for like cause faire Belge did oppresse, And right and wrong most cruelly confound: And so be now Grantorto, who no lesse Then all the rest burst out to all outragiousnesse.

3

Gainst whom Sir Artegall, long having since Taken in hand th’exploit, being theretoo Appointed by that mightie Faerie Prince,4 Great Gloriane, that Tyrant to fordoo,5 Through other great adventures hethertoo Had it forslackt. But now time drawing ny,

1

sacred: accursed. impotent: ungovernable. 3 common weales: commonwealths. 2

4

Gloriana, like Elizabeth, is sometimes called prince. 5 fordoo: do in.

165

166

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

To him assynd, her high beheast to doo, To the sea shore he gan his way apply, To weete if shipping readie he mote there descry. 4

Tho when they came to the sea coast, they found A ship all readie (as good fortune fell) To put to sea, with whom they did compound,1 To passe them over, where them list to tell: The winde and weather served them so well, That in one day they with the coast did fall;2 Whereas they readie found them to repell, Great hostes of men in order martiall, Which them forbad to land, and footing did forstall.

5

But nathemore would they from land refraine, But when as nigh unto the shore they drew, That foot of man might sound the bottome plaine,3 Talus into the sea did forth issew, Though darts from shore and stones they at him threw; And wading through the waves with stedfast sway, Maugre the might of all those troupes in vew, Did win the shore, whence he them chast away, And made to fly, like doves, whom the Eagle doth affray.

6

The whyles Sir Artegall, with that old knight4 Did forth descend, there being none them neare, And forward marched to a towne in sight. By this5 came tydings to the Tyrants eare, By those, which earst did fly away for feare Of their arrivall: wherewith troubled sore, He all his forces streight to him did reare, And forth issuing with his scouts afore, Meant them to have incountred, ere thy left the shore.

1

compound: contract, strike a deal. Just as the voyage from England to Ireland could last one day. Gough associates Artegall’s landing with Lord Grey’s arrival as Lord Deputy of Ireland (316). 2

3 I.e., near enough to shore that a man might stand. 4 I.e., Sir Sergis. 5 By this: by this time.

Canto Twelve

7

But ere he marched farre, he with them met, And fiercely charged them with all his force; But Talus sternely did upon them set, And brusht,1 and battred them without remorse, That on the ground he left full many a corse; Ne any able was him to withstand, But he them overthrew both man and horse, That they lay scattred over all the land, As thicke as doth the seede after the sowers hand.

8

Till Artegall him seeing so to rage, Willd him to stay, and signe of truce did make: To which all harkning, did a while asswage Their forces furie, and their terror slake; Till he an Herauld cald, and to him spake, Willing him wend unto the Tyrant streight, And tell him that not for such slaughters sake He thether came, but for to trie the right Of fayre Irenaes cause with him in single fight.2

9

And willed him for to reclayme with speed His scattred people, ere they all were slaine, And time and place convenient to areed,3 In which they two the combat might darraine.4 Which message when Grantorto heard, full fayne5 And glad he was the slaughter so to stay, And pointed for the combat twixt them twayne The morrow next, ne gave him longer day. So sounded the retraite, and drew his folke away.

10

That night Sir Artegall did cause his tent There to be pitched on the open plaine; For he6 had given streight commaundement, That none should dare him once to entertaine:7 Which none durst breake, though many would right faine

1 Recalls that Talus attacks with a flail––he goes on in this stanza to thresh and plant his enemies. 2 Cf. i.25. 3 areed: appoint. 4 darraine: settle.

5

167

fayne: desirous. I.e., Grantorto. 7 Perhaps Artegall has learned from his mistake with Radigund when he accepted her offer of entertainment (iv.51). 6

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

168

For fayre Irena, whom they loved deare. But yet old Sergis did so well him paine, That from close1 friends, that dar’d not to appeare, He all things did purvay, which for them needfull weare. 11

The morrow next, that was the dismall day, Appointed for Irenas death before, So soone as it did to the world display His chearefull face, and light to men restore, The heavy2 Mayd, to whom none tydings bore Of Artegals arryvall, her to free, Lookt up with eyes full sad and hart full sore; Weening3 her lifes last howre then neare to bee, Sith no redemption nigh she did nor heare nor see.

12

Then up she rose, and on her selfe did dight4 Most squalid garments, fit for such a day, And with dull countenance, and with doleful spright, She forth was brought in sorrowfull dismay, For to receive the doome of her decay.5 But comming to the place, and finding there Sir Artegall, in battailous array Wayting his foe, it did her dead hart cheare, And new life to her lent, in midst of deadly feare.

13

Like as a tender Rose in open plaine, That with untimely drought nigh withered was, And hung the head, soone as few drops of raine Thereon distill,6 and deaw her daintie face, Gins to looke up, and with fresh wonted grace Dispreds the glorie of her leaves gay; Such was Irenas countenance, such her case, When Artegall she saw in that array, There wayting for the Tyrant, till it was farre day.7

1

close: secret. I.e., heavy with sorrow. 3 Weening: judging.

5 the

4

7

2

dight: place.

doome of her decay: her death sentence.

6

distill: trickle down, infuse. farre day: late in the day.

Canto Twelve

14

Who came at length, with proud presumpteous gate, Into the field, as if he fearelesse were, All armed in a cote of yron plate, Of great defence to ward the deadly feare, And on his head a steele cap he did weare Of colour rustie browne, but sure and strong; And in his hand an huge Polaxe did beare, Whose steale1 was yron studded, but not long, With which he wont to fight, to justifie his wrong.2

15

Of stature huge and hideous he was, Like to a Giant for his monstrous hight, And did in strength most sorts of men surpas, Ne ever any found his match in might; Thereto he had great skill in single fight: His face was ugly, and his countenance sterne, That could have frayd one with the very sight, And gaped like a gulfe, when he did gerne,3 That whether man or monster one could scarce discerne.

16

Soone as he did within the listes4 appeare, With dreadfull looke he Artegall beheld, As if he would have daunted him with feare, And grinning griesly, did against him weld His deadly weapon, which in hand he held. But th’Elfin swayne, that oft had seene like sight, Was with his ghastly count’nance nothing queld, But gan him streight to buckle to the fight, And cast his shield about, to be in readie plight.5

17

The trompets sound, and they together goe, With dreadfull terror, and with fell intent; And their huge strokes full daungerously bestow, To doe most dammage, where as most they ment. But with such force and furie violent, The tyrant thundred his thicke blowes so fast,

1

3

2

4

steale: handle. Grantorto’s armor resembles that of the Galloglass, the Irish foot soldier, as Spenser describes him in A View (74).

169

gerne: snarl. listes: barriers enclosing the tournament field. 5 plight: position.

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

170

That through the yron walles their way they rent, And even to the vitall parts they past, Ne ought could them endure, but all they cleft or brast.1 18

Which cruell outrage when as Artegall Did well avize,2 thenceforth with warie heed He shund his strokes, where ever they did fall, And way did give unto their gracelesse speed: As when a skilfull Marriner doth reed A storme approching, that doth perill threat, He will not bide the daunger of such dread, But strikes his sayles, and vereth3 his mainsheat, And lends unto it leave the emptie ayre to beat.

19

So did the Faerie knight himselfe abeare,4 And stouped oft his head from shame to shield; No shame to stoupe, ones head more high to reare, And much to gaine, a litle for to yield; So stoutest knights doen oftentimes in field. But still the tyrant sternely at him layd, And did his yron axe so nimbly wield, That many wounds into his flesh it made, And with his burdenous blowes him sore did overlade.5

20

Yet when as fit advantage he did spy, The whiles the cursed felon high did reare His cruell hand, to smite him mortally, Under his stroke he to him stepping neare, Right in the flanke him strooke with deadly dreare,6 That the gore bloud thence gushing grievously, Did underneath him like a pond appeare, And all his armour did with purple dye; Thereat he brayed loud, and yelled dreadfully.

21

Yet the huge stroke, which he before intended, Kept on his course, as he did it direct, And with such monstrous poise7 adowne descended,

1

brast: burst. avize: observe. 3 vereth: lets out. 4 abeare: comport. 2

5

overlade: overload. with deadly dreare: with the grimness of death. 7 poise: weight. 6

Canto Twelve

171

That seemed nought could him from death protect: But he it well did ward with wise respect,1 And twixt him and the blow his shield did cast, Which thereon seizing, tooke no great effect, But byting deepe therein did sticke so fast, That by no meanes it backe againe he forth could wrast. 22

Long while he tug’d and strove, to get it out, And all his powre applyed thereunto, That he therewith the knight drew all about: Nathlesse, for all that ever he could doe, His axe he could not from his shield undoe. Which Artegall perceiving, strooke no more, But loosing soone his shield, did it forgoe, And whiles he combred was therewith so sore, He gan at him let drive more fiercely then afore.2

23

So well he him pursew’d, that at the last, He stroke him with Chrysaor 3 on the hed, That with the souse4 thereof full sore aghast, He staggered to and fro in doubtfull sted. Againe whiles he him saw so ill bested, He did him smite with all his might and maine, That falling on his mother earth he fed:5 Whom when he saw prostrated on the plaine, He lightly reft6 his head, to ease him of his paine.

24

Which when the people round about him saw, They shouted all for joy of his successe, Glad to be quit from that proud Tyrants awe, Which with strong powre did them long time oppresse; And running all with greedie joyfulnesse To faire Irena, at her feet did fall,

1

respect: care, alert reaction. Artegall’s act of letting go his shield can be compared with Burbon’s (xi.46). 3 Artegall’s sword from Astraea (i.9). It was 2

supposedly broken by Radigund, however (v.21). 4 souse: thump. 5 I.e., he fed upon the earth, or bit the dust. 6 reft: severed.

172

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

And her adored with due humblenesse, As their true Liege and Princesse naturall;1 And eke her champions glorie sounded over all. 25

Who streight her leading with meete majestie Unto the pallace, where their kings did rayne, Did her therein establish peaceablie, And to her kingdomes seat restore agayne; And all such persons, as did late maintayne That Tyrants part, with close or open ayde, He sorely punished with heavie payne; That in short space, whiles there with her he stayd, Not one was left, that durst her once have disobayd.2

26

During which time, that he did there remaine, His studie was true Justice how to deale, And day and night employ’d his busie paine3 How to reforme that ragged common-weale: And that same yron man which could reveale All hidden crimes, through all that realme he sent, To search out those, that usd to rob and steale, Or did rebell gainst lawfull government; On whom he did inflict most grievous punishment.

27

But ere he could reforme it thoroughly, He through occasion called was away, To Faerie Court, that of necessity His course of Justice he was forst to stay, And Talus to revoke from the right way, In which he was that Realme for to redresse.4 But envies cloud still dimmeth vertues ray.5 So having freed Irena from distresse, He tooke his leave of her, there left in heavinesse.

1

I.e., by the law of nature and so by divine right. 2 In this and the following stanzas, Spenser most clearly allegorizes English efforts in Ireland and Grey’s tenure as Lord Deputy of Ireland. See Introduction, 3. 3 paine: efforts.

4

I.e., Artegall recalls Talus from the path he was in, which aimed at the reordering of the realm. 5 Lord Grey was called back from Ireland by Elizabeth, amid complaints that his rule had been too violent. See A View, 103.

Canto Twelve

28

Tho as he backe returned from that land, And there arriv’d againe, whence forth he set, He had not passed farre upon the strand,1 When as two old ill favour’d Hags he met, By the way side being together set, Two griesly creatures; and, to that2 their faces Most foule and filthie were, their garments yet Being all rag’d and tatter’d, their disgraces Did much the more augment, and made most ugly cases.

29

The one of them, that elder did appeare, With her dull eyes did seeme to looke askew, That her mis-shape much helpt;3 and her foule heare Hung loose and loathsomely: Thereto her hew Was wan and leane, that all her teeth arew,4 And all her bones might through her cheekes be red; Her lips were like raw lether, pale and blew, And as she spake, therewith she slavered; Yet spake she seldom, but thought more, the lesse she sed.

30

Her hands were foule and durtie, never washt In all her life, with long nayles over raught, Like puttocks5 clawes: with th’one of which she scracht Her cursed head, although it itched naught; The other held a snake with venime fraught, On which she fed, and gnawed hungrily, As if that long she had not eaten ought; That round about her jawes one might descry The bloudie gore and poyson dropping lothsomely.

31

Her name was Envie, knowen well thereby;6 Whose nature is to grieve, and grudge at all, That ever she sees doen prays-worthily, Whose sight to her is greatest crosse, may fall, And vexeth so, that makes her eat her gall. For when she wanteth other thing to eat,

1

strand: shore. to that: to that end. 3 helpt: augmented. 4 arew: in a row. 2

5

173

puttocks: a kite’s or buzzard’s. This portrait resembles Envy in the pageant of Deadly Sins, although there Envy is male (I.iv.30–32). 6

174

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

She feedes on her owne maw1 unnaturall, And of her owne foule entrayles makes her meat; Meat fit for such a monsters monsterous dyeat. 32

And if she hapt of any good to heare, That had to any happily betid,2 Then would she inly fret, and grieve, and teare Her flesh for felnesse,3 which she inward hid: But if she heard of ill, that any did, Or harme, that any had, then would she make Great cheare, like one unto a banquet bid; And in anothers losse great pleasure take, As she had got thereby, and gayned a great stake.

33

The other nothing better was, then shee; Agreeing in bad will and cancred kynd,4 But in bad maner they did disagree: For what so Envie good or bad did fynd, She did conceale, and murder5 her owne mynd; But this, what ever evill she conceived, Did spred abroad, and throw in th’open wynd. Yet this in all her words might be perceived, That all she sought, was mens good name to have bereaved.

34

For what soever good by any sayd, Or doen she heard, she would streightwayes invent, How to deprave,6 or slaunderously upbrayd, Or to misconstrue of a mans intent, And turne to ill the thing, that well was ment. Therefore she used often to resort, To common haunts, and companies frequent, To hearke what any one did good report, To blot the same with blame, or wrest7 in wicked sort.

35

And if that any ill she heard of any, She would it eeke,8 and make much worse by telling, And take great joy to publish it to many,

1

5

2

6

maw: jaws, throat, belly, or womb. happily betid: by chance happened. 3 felnesse: malignity. 4 cancred kynd: corrupted nature.

murder: torment. deprave: defame. 7 wrest: twist. 8 eeke: increase.

Canto Twelve

175

That every matter worse was for her melling.1 Her name was hight Detraction, and her dwelling Was neare to Envie, even her neighbour next; A wicked hag, and Envy selfe excelling In mischiefe: for her selfe she onely vext;2 But this same both her selfe, and others eke perplext. 36

Her face was ugly, and her mouth distort, Foming with poyson round about her gils,3 In which her cursed tongue full sharpe and short Appear’d like Aspis sting, that closely4 kils, Or cruelly does wound, whom so she wils: A distaffe in her other hand she had,5 Upon the which she litle spinnes, but spils,6 And faynes to weave false tales and leasings7 bad, To throw amongst the good, which others had disprad.

37

These two now had themselves combynd in one, And linckt together gainst Sir Artegall, For whom they wayted as his mortall fone, How they might make him into mischiefe fall, For freeing from their snares Irena thrall,8 Besides unto themselves they gotten had A monster, which the Blatant beast9 men call, A dreadfull feend of gods and men ydrad,10 Whom they by slights allur’d, and to their purpose lad.

38

Such were these Hags, and so unhandsome drest: Who when they nigh approching, had espyde Sir Artegall return’d from his late quest, They both arose, and at him loudly cryde,

1

melling: meddling. I.e., Envie vexes only herself. 3 gils: cheeks. 4 closely: secretly. See Ps. 140.3. 5 Recalls Artegall’s distaff (v.23). 6 spils: spoils. 7 leasings: lies. 8 Gough points out that this is the only passage to imply that Irena fell into 2

Grantorto’s power by means of Envie and Detraction. 9 Spenser appears to have coined the word blatant, based on “bleat” and the Latin word for “to babble.” The Blatant Beast is a figure for scandal and uncivil rumor, and in Book Six it will be hunted by Sir Calidore, the knight of Courtesie. See Introduction, 10. In A View, Spenser writes of how “Envy list to blatter against” Lord Grey (28). 10 ydrad: feared.

176

The Faerie Queene: Book Five

As it had bene two shepheards curres, had scryde1 A ravenous Wolfe amongst the scattered flockes. And Envie first, as she that first him eyde, Towardes him runs, and with rude flaring lockes About her eares, does beat her brest, and forhead knockes. 39

Then from her mouth the gobbet2 she does take, The which whyleare she was so greedily Devouring, even that halfe-gnawen snake, And at him throwes it most despightfully. The cursed Serpent, though she hungrily Earst chawd thereon, yet was not all so dead, But that some life remayned secretly, And as he past afore withouten dread, Bit him behind, that long the marke was to be read.3

40

Then th’other comming neare, gan him revile, And fouly rayle, with all she could invent; Saying, that he had with unmanly guile, And foule abusion4 both his honour blent, And that bright sword, the sword of Justice lent Had stayned with reprochfull crueltie, In guiltlesse blood of many an innocent: As for Grandtorto, him with treacherie And traynes having surpriz’d, he fouly did to die.5

41

Thereto the Blatant beast by them set on At him began aloud to barke and bay, With bitter rage and fell contention, That all the woods and rockes nigh to that way, Began to quake and tremble with dismay; And all the aire rebellowed againe. So dreadfully his hundred tongues did bray, And evermore those hags them selves did paine, To sharpen6 him, and their owne cursed tongs did straine.

1

scryde: descried. gobbet: piece of raw meat. 3 The snake bites Artegall, enacting the phrase “back-biting.” 4 abusion: deception, abusive behavior. 5 Gough connects these accusations to the 2

massacre Grey ordered at Smerwick (319). For Smerwick, see Introduction, 3. In A View, Spenser writes of Grey that “complaint was made against him, that he was a bloodie man” (103). 6 sharpen: goad.

Canto Twelve

42

And still among1 most bitter wordes they spake, Most shamefull, most unrighteous, most untrew, That they the mildest man alive would make Forget his patience, and yeeld vengeaunce dew To her, that so false sclaunders2 at him threw. And more to make them pierce and wound more deepe, She with the sting, which in her vile tongue grew, Did sharpen them, and in fresh poyson steepe: Yet he past on, and seem’d of them to take no keepe.

43

But Talus hearing her so lewdly raile, And speake so ill of him, that well deserved, Would her have chastiz’d with his yron flaile, If her Sir Artegall had not preserved, And him forbidden, who his heast3 observed. So much the more at him still did she scold, And stones did cast, yet he for nought would swerve From his right course, but still the way did hold To Faery Court, where what him fell shall else be told.

1

among: during that time.

2

sclaunders: slanders.

3

heast: command.

177

THE LETTER TO RALEIGH A Letter of the Authors expounding his whole intention in the course of this worke: which for that it giueth great light to the Reader, for the better vnderstanding is hereunto annexed. To the Right noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh knight, Lo. Wardein of the Stanneryes, and her Maiesties liefetenaunt of the County of Cornewayll.1 Sir knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, and this booke of mine, which I have entituled the Faery Queene, being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good aswell for avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned.The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline:2 Which for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible3 and pleasing, being coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter, then for profite of the ensample: I chose the historye of king Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In which I have followed all the antique Poets historicall, first Homere, who in the Persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his Odysseis: then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person of Aeneas: after him Ariosto comprised them

1

Appended to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh,” also called “A Letter of the Authors,” has been read as a preface, detailing both the larger plot and the poetics underlying the poem. It was not included in the 1596 edi-

tion, and so only discusses the first three books directly. 2 discipline: learning, training, orderly conduct, the system by which a church exercises control over its members. 3 plausible: deserving applause, acceptable.

178

The Letter to Raleigh

179

both in his Orlando:1 and lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that part which they in Philosophy call Ethice, or vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo:The other named Politice in his Godfredo.2 By ensample of which excellente Poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised,3 the which is the purpose of these first twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encoraged, to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hee came to be king.4 To some I know this Methode will seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the use of these dayes seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon preferred before Plato, for that the one in the exquisite depth of his judgement, formed a Commune welth such as it should be, but the other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a government such as might best be: So much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by ensample, then by rule.5 So have I laboured to doe in the person of Arthure: whome I conceive after his long education by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery land. And yet in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady, this latter part in some places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phoebe and Cynthia being both names of Diana).6 So in the person of 1

Lodovico Ariosto, Italian author of Orlando Furioso (1532). 2 Torquato Tasso, Italian author of Rinaldo (1562) and Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), in which the hero Godfredo embodies public or political virtues. 3 Aristotle does not name twelve particular moral virtues in the Nicomachaean Ethics. There are, however, several Medieval and Renaissance commentaries on Aristotle from which twelve could be construed. 4 Spenser indicates that he planned twelve books for The Faerie Queene and would

willingly write twenty-four, the former matching Virgil, the latter Homer. 5 Spenser says that Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, celebrated for teaching by example, is commonly preferred to Plato’s Republic, which taught by precepts. 6 Belphoebe appears in Books Two, Three, and Four. Cynthia refers to Raleigh’s poem of that name, which also celebrated Elizabeth. Spenser suggests that Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, represents Elizabeth’s public role as monarch, while Belphoebe personifies her private, virginal life.

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Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particular, which vertue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue, which I write of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues, I make xii. other knights the patrones, for the more variety of the history: Of which these three bookes contayn three.The first of the knight of the Redcrosse, in whome I expresse Holynes:The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette forth Temperaunce: The third of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the Methode of a Poet historical is not such, as of an Historiographer. For an Historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a Poet thrusteth into the middest,1 even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a pleasing Analysis of all.The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an Historiographer should be the twelfth booke, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queene kept her Annuall feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, are in these xii books severally handled and discoursed.The first was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe a tall clownishe 2 younge man, who falling before the Queen of Faries desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen, that being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after entred a faire Ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a white Asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the Armes of a knight, and his speare in the dwarfes hand. Shee falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned that her father and mother an ancient King and Queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen3 Castle, who thence suffred them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wondering, and the Lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly importuned his desire. In the end the Lady told him that unlesse that armour which she brought, would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint Paul v. Ephes.4) that he could not succeed in that enterprise, which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furnitures5 thereunto, he seemed the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady. And 1

4

2

5

See Horace, Ars Poetica, 146–52. clownishe: rustic. 3 brasen: strong like brass.

See Eph. 6.11–17. dewe furnitures: proper equipment.

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eftesoones1 taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge Courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke, vz. A gentle knight was pricking on the playne. &c. The second day ther came in a Palmer bearing an Infant with bloody hands, whose Parents he complained to have bene slayn by an Enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him some knight, to performe that adventure, which being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same Palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole subject thereof.2 The third day there came in, a Groome who complained before the Faery Queene, that a vile Enchaunter called Busirane had in hand a most faire Lady called Amoretta, whom he kept in most grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her body.Whereupon Sir Scudamour the lover of that Lady presently tooke on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason of the hard Enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but rather as Accidents, then intendments.3 As the love of Britomart, the overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like.4 Thus much Sir, I have briefly overronne to direct your understanding to the welhead of the History, that from thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ye may as in a handfull gripe al the discourse, which otherwise may happily5 seeme tedious and confused. So humbly craving the continuaunce of your honorable favour towards me, and th’eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. 23. January. 1589.6

Yours most humbly affectionate. Ed. Spenser.

1

eftesoones: immediately. This description is at variance with the beginning of Book Two at several points— e.g., the Palmer is already with Guyon when they encounter the bloody baby in Canto One. 2

3

intendments: matters of central import. This description seems to make Scudamour the hero, rather than Britomart. 5 happily: by chance. 6 In the new calendar, 1590. 4

THE LIFE OF EDMUND SPENSER Spenser (c. 1552–1599) was from a merchant family, possibly involved in the cloth trade and probably living in London. Although he may have been related to the noble family of Spencers, Spenser was not a gentleman. He was fortunate to attend the Merchant Taylors’ School, an academy founded by the tailors’ guild, and was registered there as a “poor scholar.” The school, however, was excellent; in his eight years there, Spenser received a humanist education that was rich in classical scholarship and languages. In 1569 he entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Again he was a scholarship student, called a sizar, earning room and board by performing servants’ duties. In the same year that he arrived at Cambridge, Spenser was first published: several of his translations from Italian and French appeared in the Protestant miscellany A Theatre for Worldlings. Spenser completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1573, and then, in 1576, a Master of Arts (finishing 66th out of a class of 70). Spenser then began a career as secretary to high-ranking men, a position of some importance involving a broad array of duties that included much traveling and writing. Intermittent records show him serving as an emissary for the earl of Leicester, and in 1578 he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. In 1579 he married Maccabaeus Chylde; we know little about the couple’s family life other than the fact that they had two children. In 1580 he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, and traveled there with him. Spenser’s career as a secretary and subsequent work as a civil servant in Ireland no doubt took up much of his time. But he was simultaneously establishing a second career as a poet. Probably while working for Leicester, Spenser met Philip Sidney and entered into his sophisticated literary circle. In 1579 Spenser published The Shepheardes Calendar, his innovative and enormously influential collection of pastorals. It revealed Spenser as not only one of England’s most skilled poets, but as a deeply interested and progressive Protestant thinker. He also cultivated his university friendship with the humanist scholar Gabriel Harvey, which in 1580 led to the publication of several of their letters. The Harvey letters mention several lost works, and suggest that by 1580 Spenser had begun working on The Faerie Queene. Meanwhile, in Ireland with Lord Grey, Spenser participated in the complicated and exceedingly violent project of English colonialism. Grey was sent to govern a country that was struggling broadly against English domination, and he adopted a strategy of overwhelming force, including the notorious slaughter of 600 military prisoners at Smerwick, and policies aimed at subduing the population through famine. To what 182

The Life of Edmund Spenser

183

extent Spenser participated in Grey’s governance, and to what extent he merely accompanied him and performed secretarial duties, is unclear. But it is clear that Spenser profited personally from empire building. Although Grey was recalled to England in 1582, Spenser made Ireland his permanent home, first in the New Abbey estate, and in 1589 in the three thousand acres of the Kilcolman estate. Throughout the 1580s, Spenser received a number of governmental appointments and established himself in Ireland as a well-off planter and gentleman. His complex relationship to Ireland is largely understood through A View of the Present State of Ireland, a prose dialogue that forthrightly defends Grey’s violent tactics and advocates deeply repressive measures against the Irish. It has called forth both defenses of the poet and declarations of his complicity in the outrages of colonialism. The subtleties of A View cast a similarly complicated light on The Faerie Queene, which was written in Ireland, and reflects its beautiful and pitifully war-torn landscape. In Ireland Spenser became friends with the explorer, author, and courtier, Sir Walter Raleigh, who in 1589 traveled with him to England. Probably with the sponsorship of Raleigh, Spenser presented the first three books of The Faerie Queene to Elizabeth, who, by Spenser’s report, was well pleased. Spenser secured the printer William Ponsonby in London, and Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were published in 1590. The poem was a clear effort to win court favor, with a dedication to Elizabeth and as many as seventeen dedicatory sonnets to the major figures in court. As a reward, Spenser was granted a pension of £50 a year for life. Such a position in the patronage system of the day was not unusual, as poetry was commonly used as a means of preferment in court— for noblemen such as Sidney and Raleigh, it was one more personal accomplishment; for those like Spenser who were not noble, it was a way to win social and economic advantages. Spenser, however, maintained skepticism toward court life. In his pastoral “Colin Clouts Come Home Again,” which tells of his and Raleigh’s journey to court, Colin declares that it is no sort of life, For shepheard fit to lead in that same place, Where each one seeks with malice and with strife, To thrust downe other into foule disgrace, Himselfe to raise. (688–92) Spenser returned to Ireland, where he lived, worked, and wrote throughout the 1590s. He published several important poems under the title of Complaints in 1591. In 1594 he married Elizabeth Boyle, resulting

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in at least one child, and in the following year he published Amoretti and Epithalamion, which celebrate their love and marriage. Throughout these years he continued work on The Faerie Queene, and in 1596 published the second edition. This extended the poem to six books; its final form was reached in the posthumous 1609 edition, with the inclusion of the fragment of a seventh book, The Mutabilitie Cantos. In 1596 he also published Fowre Hymnes and Prothalamion. Spenser may have traveled to London to oversee the second printing of The Faerie Queene. If so, he returned to an Ireland wracked by rebellion. In 1598 the Tyrone Rebellion reached Munster, and Spenser and his family fled Kilcolman just before the estate was sacked and burned. Spenser carried letters from the President of Munster to the Privy Council in England, describing the military crisis. On January 13, 1599, while still in England, Spenser died. His life ended under the shadow cast by the destruction of his home and the scattering of his interests in Ireland, which Ben Jonson described, possibly hyperbolically, as dying “for lack of bread.” Spenser’s hearse was reportedly attended by poets, who threw their verses and pens into his tomb as he was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

TEXTUAL NOTES This text is based upon the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene, from microfilm of the volume in the Huntington Library (STC 23082). It has been checked against the 1609 edition, from microfilm of the volume in the Harvard University Library (STC 23083). Spelling and punctuation follow the 1596 edition. Quotation marks have been added; i, j, s, u, and v have been modernized; and abbreviations, ampersands, and diphthongs have been spelled out. Departures from the 1596 edition have been made with the aim of clarifying the text for modern readers. The table below lists substantive variants. Proem 11.2 place] 1596; stead, 1609. i.16.2 why?] 1609; why, 1596. i.25.1 Now] 1609; now, 1596. ii.2.7 As] 1609; And, 1596. ii.4.1 hee] 1609; she, 1596. ii.32.4 earth] 1609; eare, 1596. ii.37.7 be?] 1609; be., 1596. ii.46.9 way.] 1596; lay., 1609. ii.50.5 make] 1609; makes, 1596. iii.40.6 we] 1609; were, 1596. iv.36.8 halfe] 1596; arm’d, 1609. iv.39.3 doale] 1609; doile, 1596. vi.4.7 from] 1596; for, 1609. vi.17.5 Heard] 1609; Here, 1596.

vi.24.1 their] 1596; her, 1609. vi.34.7 their] 1596; that, 1609. vii.21.4 could’st] 1609; coulst, 1596. vii.38.5 bad] 1596; sad, 1609. viii.16.1 them] 1609; then, 1596. viii.43.3 love] 1609; loves, 1596. viii.49.1 mad] 1596; bad, 1609. ix.18.4 hard]1609; hart, 1596. ix.33.8 rebellions] 1596; rebellious, 1609. ix.44.1 appose] 1596; oppose, 1609. x.37.6 hard] 1596; had, 1609. xi.60.2 had] 1596; have, 1609. xii.16.6 sight] 1609; fight, 1596. xii.17.5 such] 1596; sure, 1609.

185

GLOSSARY albe: Although, despite. Assay: Attempt, attack, proof. beheast: Command, promise. bewray: Reveal. carle: Churl, villain. doome: Judgment, fate. earst: Earlier, lately. eftsoones: Soon after, immediately. eke: (Adverb) and; (verb) increase. fone: Foes. hew: Appearance. hight: Called. lore: Wisdom, learning. maugre: Despite. meed(e): Reward, bribe. mickle: Much. Paynim: Pagan. pight: Placed, pitched. preasse, preace: Press, crowd. prove: Try, test. read, reed: (Verb) read, determine, judge; (noun) judgment, subject. rout: Crowd, mob. sleight, slight: Trick, trap. stoure, stowre: Storm, time of turmoil. traine, trayne: Treachery, strategy, trap. weed(s): Clothing. weet, weete, wote: Know. wend: Go. whylome: In the past, once upon a time. wight: Person, creature.

186

INDEX OF CHARACTERS References to and appearances of major characters in Book Five are listed by canto and stanza. In parentheses are references and appearances in other books, listed by book, canto, and stanza. This index is indebted to Shohachi Fukuda’s “The Characters of The Faerie Queene” in Hamilton. Adicia, viii.20–26; 45–ix.2 Amidas and Bracidas, iv.4–20 Artegall, passim (III.ii.10–25;

Florimell, iii.14–27 (III.i.15–18; iv.45–53; v.4–12; vii.1–32; viii.20–50; IV.v.2–6; xii.6–35)

Geryoneo, x.6–14; xi.1–32 Grantorto, i.3; xi.50–53; xii.9–23 Guyon, iii.29–37 (II passim;

iii.26–28; IV.iv.39–44; vi.2–46)

Arthur, viii.4–45; ix.2–50; x.4–xi.35 (I.vii.29–ix.20; II.viii.17–xi.49; III.1.1–18; iv.45–v.12; IV.vii.42–ix.37; VI.v.11–viii.30)

III.i.1–18; iv.45–46)

Astraea, i.5–12 Belge, x.6–39; xi.15–20; 32–35 Braggadochio, iii.10–39

Irena, i.3–4; xi.36–43; xii.3–27 Malengin, ix.4–19 Malfont, ix.25–26 Marinell, iii.2–26 (III.iv.12–43;

(II.iii.4–46; III.viii.11–18; x.20–54; IV.iv.8–21; v.23–27) Britomart, vi.3–vii.45 (III passim; IV.i.5–17; i.35–36; iv.44–48; v.13–29; vi.9–47; ix.20–37)

v.8–10; vi.54; viii.46; IV.xi.6–7; xii.3–35)

Mercilla, viii.16–24; ix.20–50; x.3–5; 14–16 Munera and Pollente, ii.4–28 Radigund, iv.21–v.57; vii.25–34 Samient, viii.4–26; 46–48; ix.3–22 Sanglier, i.14–29 (IV.iv.40) Sergis, xi.37–59; xii.4–10 Souldan, viii.18–45 Talus, i.12; 20–22; ii.20–28; 49–54; iii.37–38; iv.24; 44–51; v.19; vi.8–18; 26–30; vii.3; 35–36; viii.29; ix.16–19; xi.47; 59; 65; xii.5–8; 26–27; 43 Terpine, iv.21–51; v.18

Burbon, xi.44–65 Clarinda, iv.48; v.29–57 Detraction and Envie, xii.28–43 Dolon, vi.19–40 Dony, ii.2–10 (III.v.3–12) Duessa, ix.36–50; x.4 (I.ii.13–45; iv.2–3; 37–51; v.11–44; vii.2–18; viii.25–49; xii.24–36; II.i.8–30; IV.i.17–32; v.11)

Egalitarian Giant, ii.29–54 False Florimell, iii.17–26 (III.viii.5–19; IV.ii.3–19; iv.7–11; v.13–27)

187

WORKS CITED AND BIBLIOGRAPHY Anderson, Judith. “‘Nor Man It Is’: The Knight of Justice in Book V of Spenser’s Faerie Queene.” PMLA 85 (1970): 65–77. Aptekar, Jane. Icons of Justice: Iconography and Thematic Imagery in Book V of The Faerie Queene. New York: Columbia University Press, 1969. Ariosto, Ludovico. Orlando Furioso. Translated by Guido Waldman. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. Aristotle. The Nicomachean Ethics. Translated by H. Rackham. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982. Bellamy, Elizabeth. “The Vocative and the Vocational: The Unreadability of Elizabeth in The Faerie Queene.” ELH 54 (1987): 1–30. Bieman, Elizabeth. “Britomart in Book V of The Faerie Queene.” University of Toronto Quarterly 37 (1968): 156–74. Borris, Kenneth. Spenser’s Poetics of Prophecy in The Faerie Queene V. Victoria, Canada: English Literary Studies, University of Victoria, 1991. Bowman, Mary. “‘She there as Princess rained’: Spenser’s Figure of Elizabeth.” Renaissance Quarterly 43 (1990): 509–28. Bradshaw, Brendan, Andrew Hadfield, and Willy Maley, eds. Representing Ireland: Literature and the Origins of Conflict, 1534–1660. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. Brady, Ciarán. “Spenser’s Irish Crisis: Humanism and Experience in the 1590s.” Past and Present 111 (1986): 17–49. Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Lectures 1808–1819: On Literature. Edited by R. A. Foakes. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987. Coughlan, Patricia, ed. Spenser and Ireland: An Interdisciplinary Perspective. Cork: Cork University Press, 1989. Dunseath, T. K. Spenser’s Allegory of Justice in Book Five of The Faerie Queene. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1979. Eggert, Katherine. Showing Like a Queen: Female Authority and Literary Experiment in Spenser, Shakespeare, and Milton. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2000. Fletcher, Angus. Allegory:The Theory of a Symbolic Mode. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1964. ———. The Prophetic Moment: An Essay on Spenser. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971. Fowler, Alastair. Spenser and the Numbers of Time. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1964. Fowler, Elizabeth. “The Failure of Moral Philosophy in the Work of Edmund Spenser.” Representations 51 (1995): 47–76.

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Gallagher, Lowell. Medusa’s Gaze: Casuistry and Conscience in the Renaissance. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1991. Goldberg, Jonathan. James I and the Politics of Literature: Jonson, Shakespeare, Donne and Their Contemporaries. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983. Graziani, René. “Elizabeth at Isis Church.” PMLA 79 (1964): 376–89. Greenblatt, Stephen. “Murdering Peasants: Status, Genre, and the Representation of Rebellion.” Representations 1 (1983): 1–29. ———. Renaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1984. Greenlaw, Edwin, et al. The Works of Edmund Spenser: A Variorum Edition. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1932–57. Gregory, Tobias. “Shadowing Intervention: On the Politics of The Faerie Queene, Book 5, Cantos 10–12.” ELH 67 (2000): 365–97. Gross, Kenneth. Spenserian Poetics: Idolatry, Iconoclasm, and Magic. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1985. Hadfield, Andrew. Edmund Spenser’s Irish Experience:Wilde Fruit and Salvage Soyl. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. ———, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Spenser. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Hamilton, A. C., et al., eds. The Spenser Encyclopedia. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1990; rev. 1992. Harrington, John. Orlando Furioso: In English Heroical Verse. London, 1591. Heale, Elizabeth. The Faerie Queene: A Reader’s Guide. Second edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Hesiod, The Theogony. Translated by Hugh G. Evelyn-White. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1982. King, John. Spenser’s Poetry and the Reformation Tradition. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990. Lewis, C. S. The Allegory of Love: A Study in Medieval Tradition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1936. ———. Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1966. ———. Spenser’s Images of Life. Edited by Alastair Fowler. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1967. Lotspeich, Henry Gibbons. Classical Mythology in the Poetry of Edmund Spenser. New York: Gordian Press, 1965. Maley, Willy. A Spenser Chronology. Lanham, MD: Barnes & Noble Books, 1994. ———. Salvaging Spenser: Colonialism, Culture and Identity. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997.

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Mallette, Richard. Spenser and the Discourses of Reformation England. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1997. Marcus, Leah S., Janel Mueller, and Mary Beth Rose. Elizabeth I: Collected Works. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. McCabe, Richard A. “The Masks of Duessa: Spenser, Mary, Queen of Scots, and James VI.” English Literary Renaissance 17 (1987): 224–42. McCaffrey, Isabel G. Spenser’s Allegory:The Anatomy of Imagination. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1976. Meyer, Russell J. The Faerie Queene: Educating the Reader. Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1991. Miller, David Lee, and Alexander Dunlop, eds. Approaches to Teaching Spenser’s Faerie Queene. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 1994. Ovid. Metamorphoses. Translated by Frank Justus Miller. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994. Patterson, Annabel. “The Egalitarian Giant: Representations of Justice in History/Literature.” The Journal of British Studies 31.2 (1992): 97–132. Phillips, James E., Jr. “Renaissance Concepts of Justice and the Structure of The Faerie Queene, Book V.” Huntington Library Quarterly 33 (1970): 103–20. Prescott, Anne Lake. “Foreign Policy in Fairyland: Henri IV and Spenser’s Burbon.” Spenser Studies 14 (2000): 189–214. Quilligan, Maureen. The Language of Allegory: Defining the Genre. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1979. ———. “The Comedy of Female Authority in The Faerie Queene.” English Literary Renaissance 17 (1987): 156–71. Radcliffe, David Hill. Edmund Spenser: A Reception History. Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1996. Roche, Thomas P. The Kindly Flame: A Study of the Third and Fourth Books of Spenser’s Faerie Queene. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1964. Spenser, Edmund. The Faerie Queene, Book V. Edited by Alfred B. Gough. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1918. ———. The Faerie Queene. Edited by A. C. Hamilton. London: Longman, 2001. ———. A View of the State of Ireland. Edited by Andrew Hadfield and Willy Maley. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1997. Stump, Donald. “Isis versus Mercilla: The Allegorical Shrines in Spenser’s Legend of Justice.” Spenser Studies 3 (1982): 87–98. ———. “Fashioning Gender: Cross-Dressing in Spenser’s Legend of Britomart and Artegall.” Spenser Studies 15 (2001): 95–119. Teskey, Gordon. Allegory and Violence. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1996.

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Treip, Mindele Anne. Allegorical Poetics and the Epic: The Renaissance Tradition to Paradise Lost. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1994. Tuve, Rosemond. Allegorical Imagery: Some Mediaeval Books and Their Posterity. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1966. Wagner, Geoffrey. “Talus.” ELH 17 (1950): 79–86. Walker, Julia M. “Spenser’s Elizabeth Portrait and the Fiction of Dynastic Epic.” Modern Philology 90 (1992): 172–99. Waters, D. Douglas. “Spenser and the ‘Mas’ at the Temple of Isis.” Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 19:1 (1979): 43–53. Wells, Robin Headlam. Spenser’s Faerie Queene and the Cult of Elizabeth. Totowa, NJ: Barnes & Noble Books, 1983. Woods, Susanne. “Spenser and the Problem of Women’s Rule.” Huntington Library Quarterly 48 (1985): 141–58. Yates, Frances. Astraea:The Imperial Theme in the Sixteenth Century. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1975.

The Faerie Queene from Hackett Publishing Company General Editor, Abraham Stoll

Book One Edited, with Introduction, by Carol V. Kaske, Cornell University Book Two Edited, with Introduction, by Erik Gray, Columbia University

Edmund Spenser

The

Faerie Queene Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos

BOOK SIX

Spenser’s great work in five volumes. Each includes its own Introduction, annotation, notes on the text, bibliography, glossary, and index of characters; Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh” and a short Life of Edmund Spenser appear in every volume.

The Faerie Queene

Book Six and the incomplete Book Seven of The Faerie Queene are the last sections of the unfinished poem to have been published. They show Spenser inflecting his narrative with an ever more personal note, and becoming an ever more desperate and anxious author, worried that things were falling apart as Queen Elizabeth failed in health and the Irish crisis became ever more terrifying. The moral confusion and uncertainty that Calidore, the Knight of Courtesy, has to confront are symptomatic of the lack of control that Spenser saw everywhere around him. Yet, within such a troubling and disturbing work there are moments of great beauty and harmony, such as the famous dance of the Graces that Colin Clout, the rustic alter ego of the poet himself, conjures up with his pipe. Book Seven, the “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie,” is among the finest of Spenser’s poetic works, in which he explains the mythical origins of his world, as the gods debate on the hill opposite his Irish house. Whether order or chaos triumphs in the end has been the subject of most subsequent critical debate.

SPENSER

The Faerie Queene, Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos

Books Three and Four Edited, with Introduction, by Dorothy Stephens, University of Arkansas Book Five Edited, with Introduction, by Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego

ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-891-9

90000

FnL1 00 0000

9 780872 208919

HACKETT

Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos Edited by Andrew Hadfield, University of Sussex, and Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego, with Introduction by Andrew Hadfield

0891

Edited by ADFIELD and

ANDREW H

ABRAHAM STOLL Introduction by ANDREW HADFIELD

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book Six and the

Mutabilitie Cantos

Edmund Spenser

THE FAERIE QUEENE Book Six and the

Mutabilitie Cantos Edited by

Andrew Hadfield and Abraham Stoll Introduction by

Andrew Hadfield

Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. Indianapolis/Cambridge

Copyright © 2007 by Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. All rights reserved 10 09 08 07

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

For further information, please address Hackett Publishing Company, Inc. P.O. Box 44937 Indianapolis, IN 46244-0937 www.hackettpublishing.com Cover art: Walter Crane illustration and ornament for Book Six, The Faerie Queene, ca. 1890. Cover design by Abigail Coyle Interior design by Elizabeth L. Wilson Composition by Professional Book Compositors, Inc. Printed at Edwards Brothers, Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Spenser, Edmund, 1552?–1599. The faerie queene / Edmund Spenser. p. cm. Series general editor, Abraham Stoll; volume editors: bk. 1, Carol Kaske; bk. 5, Abraham Stoll. Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ISBN 0-87220-808-7 (bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-807-9 (pbk. : bk. 1) — ISBN 0-87220-802-8 (bk. 5) — ISBN 0-87220-801-X (pbk. : bk. 5) 1. Knights and knighthood—Poetry. 2. Epic poetry, English. 3. Virtues —Poetry. I. Stoll, Abraham Dylan, 1969– . II. Kaske, Carol V., 1933– . III. Title. PR2358.A3K37 2006 821'.3—dc22 2005026668 ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-891-9 (pbk., bk. 6 and the Mutabilitie Cantos) ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-892-6 (cloth, bk. 6 and the Mutabilitie Cantos) eISBN: 978-1-60384-026-2 (e-book)

CONTENTS Introduction

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The Faerie Queene, Book Six The Faerie Queene, Book Seven, the Mutabilitie Cantos The Letter to Raleigh The Life of Edmund Spenser Textual Notes Glossary Index of Characters Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

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183 223 227 230 233 235 237

INTRODUCTION

1. Book Six Book Six of The Faerie Queene is a problematic, embittered, and fascinating work, which mainly serves to unravel the project Spenser outlined in the earlier books. If, as Spenser tells Raleigh in the letter appended to the first edition of the poem in 1590, the attempt of the first three books was really to “fashion a gentlemen or noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline,” then the Knight of Courtesy, Calidore, labors under disadvantages that prevent the meaningful completion of his task. The allegorical quests that the knights have to undertake in The Faerie Queene get more complex as the poem progresses. In Book One, the Redcrosse Knight, the Knight of Holiness, completes his quest to defeat the dragon that threatens the parents of his future wife, Una (although he is unable to marry her). In Book Two, Guyon, the Knight of Temperance, destroys Acrasia’s evil bower of seductive charms, though he must recognize that in achieving this feat he has gone as far as his merits will take him. In Book Three, Britomart, the Knight of Chastity, rescues Amoret and is then forced to watch, with some envy, her reunite with Scudamore (although we know that Britomart will eventually marry Artegall, the Knight of Justice). Book Four, Of Friendship, is more complex and diffuse––perhaps the remnant of an earlier version of the poem––but at least we know what the virtue means. Book Five, Of Justice, is the first book in which the Knight, Artegall, is actually prevented from completing his quest by Gloriana, the Faerie Queen. Book Six, however, contains the most problematic quest of all, one that absorbs very little of the narrative, is unclear to both Knight and reader, and concludes, only to be undone immediately as if the process were actually futile. The Faerie Queene is probably the best non-dramatic narrative poem produced during the English Renaissance––a status achieved because of the work’s disturbing and challenging nature, not in spite of it.

Courtesy Book Six opens with a series of complex and contradictory definitions of the virtue, at times proclaiming that it stems from nature and exists in opposition to the court (Pr.4); at others, that it derives its meaning from the court itself (i.1). Calidore is said to love “simple truth and stedfast vii

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honesty” (i.3.9), yet courtesy is defined as the “roote of civill conversation” (i.1.6), suggesting that it is the art of appropriate speech, choosing the right words for the right occasion. This is a meaning more in line with contemporary theories of rhetoric. Furthermore, the narrator argues that “vertues seat is deepe within the mynd, / And not in outward shows, but inward thoughts defynd” (Pr.5.8–9), which cannot be the case if courtesy is about proper show and appearance. It is surely no surprise that Calidore is often confused and unsure how to act, and that he confesses to Artegall––and so to the readers of the poem––that he is overwhelmed by the task he has been set: “But where ye ended have, now I begin To tread an endlesse trace, withouten guyde, Or good direction, how to enter in, Or how to issue forth in waies untryde, In perils strange, in labours long and wide, In which although good Fortune me befall, Yet shall it not by none be testifyde.” (i.6.1–7)

Calidore’s task is to capture the Blatant Beast, a terrifying monster with a multitude of tongues. The first mention of the Beast is at the end of Book Five, when it attacks Artegall, the Knight of Justice, as he trudges back to Gloriana’s court after being prematurely recalled from his quest to reform the Salvage Island. Artegall is slandered by the Beast, who falsely claims that he has defeated the enemies who threaten the island by treacherous means. The Salvage Island is, as readers have long recognized, an easily decoded symbol of Ireland. Spenser is making a neat link between criticism of the hard-line policies of his erstwhile patron, the Lord Deputy of Ireland, Arthur, Lord Grey de Wilton––who argued for and practiced the violent suppression of the Irish––and the abuse of language itself. The implication is that failure to accept what must be done to make Ireland governable––for Spenser, the deployment of a huge army that will crush Irish resistance and enable the English to spread law, government, and civil society––is a form of unreason, an inability to think in proper human terms. And because such voices have triumphed in Book Five, Calidore’s quest is impossible: without the foundations of social order, the establishment of courtesy is not just difficult, but is a meaningless enterprise. The Knight of Courtesy is not speaking with pardonable hyperbole when he describes his quest as “an endlesse trace, withouten guyde”; he is telling the simple truth, even if he does not realize this yet. See Fogarty; Hadfield, 1997.

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Calidore’s Quest Calidore’s quest bears little resemblance to those of his predecessors, who had clearly defined objectives, however complex and difficult to implement these may have been (see Northrop; Teskey, 2003). Artegall was prevented from completing his quest, but at least he knew that he had to rescue Irena from the Salvage Island. Calidore is rather more significantly ignorant about the task assigned to him, and he confesses to Artegall that he does not know “how, or in what place / To find him out” (i.7.4–5). When Artegall replies that he has seen such a creature near the Salvage Island, it is clear that Calidore has no idea how the object of his quest may appear. Calidore’s adventure closely resembles that of Artegall, as they both encounter their foes only in the last canto of their respective books. But there are crucial differences. Calidore disappears for much of the narrative (Cantos Four through Nine), replaced by the somewhat colorless Calepine. When he does return, he immediately abandons his quest and assumes the life of a shepherd, one which he imagines is superior to that of a knight. (Given what is required of him, it is easy for the reader to see why he prefers one life to another.) Critics disagree about the meaning of Calidore’s pastoral sojourn, some blaming Calidore for his failure of duty, and others seeing this hiatus as a necessary education that readies him for the concluding part of his journey (A. Williams; Cain; Bernard). However these cantos are read, what is clear is that it is only in the last canto that Calidore returns to his quest, something the narrator makes sure we readers do not miss: “Tho gan Sir Calidore him to advize / Of his first quest, which he had long forlore, / Asham’d to thinke, how he that enterprize, / The which the Faery Queene had long afore / Bequeath’d to him, forslacked had so sore” (xii.12.1–5). Calidore’s introspective reflection and self-criticism show what a long way we have traveled from the careless and often humorous lack of self-knowledge of the Redcrosse Knight in Book One, who fails to realize time and again that he is vulnerable to the charms of lascivious women; or from the equally myopic behavior of Sir Guyon, the Knight of Temperance in Book Two, whose values forbid the tolerance of beauty and desire. Book Six continually asks the reader to think back through the narrative of The Faerie Queene and imagine how these episodes recall and rewrite earlier events and themes (Tonkin). There may well be an acute Spenserian joke at work: after all of Calidore’s vacillating and inability to focus on his quest, he hunts down, defeats, and binds the Blatant Beast swiftly and easily. However, the Beast escapes and launches a series of random attacks on anything and everything,

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including the work of poets. Calidore’s hunt has been in vain, as we would have known from the start, assuming we read the signs carefully enough. On the one hand, Calidore has failed because no one knight could ever have succeeded in an attempt to redeem language and make it meaningful again. On the other, his failure is the result of the lack of support he has received from the absent Faerie Queen, and of a catastrophic power vacuum at the center of the kingdom that renders the knight’s errant impotent. Calidore often appears as a comic figure, easy for the reader to ridicule. His interventions are invariably clumsy and ill timed, and frequently disastrous. Just before he disappears from the narrative, he stumbles across the courting couple, Calepine and Serena (iii.21). The lovers are understandably rather embarrassed, and the narrator intervenes to tell us that Calidore is at fault: To whom Sir Calidore approaching nye, Ere they were well aware of living wight, Them much abasht, but more him selfe thereby, That he so rudely did uppon them light, And troubled had their quiet loves delight. (iii.21.1–5)

Spenser leaves the reader in little doubt about the exact nature of the unwitting intervention by the Knight of Courtesy, and he has clearly surprised the couple in flagrante delicto. The fact that he is described as “rude” detracts from his role as the figure of courtesy, although the episode does raise––albeit humorously––questions of morality and sexual behavior. Perhaps it is really the couple who are rude and discourteous, and we should be looking at the episode as a sign that serious issues of truth and ethics have been lost in questions of decorum. More importantly, this mildly uncomfortable encounter points toward later events that truly threaten to undermine the social fabric. Serena wanders off, understandably enough, as Calidore sits down and tells Calepine “His long adventures” (iii.22.8)––hardly a proper compensation for the lost joys of love. Calepine’s response is not recorded. Serena is then attacked and wounded by the Blatant Beast (iii.24), a forceful reminder of the dangers that threaten the pastoral world of the shepherds in Book Six. A seemingly trivial error has serious consequences, which is probably less of a moral comment on Spenser’s part (as has been pointed out, The Faerie Queene is obsessively interested in all forms of sexual behavior [Paglia]) than it is a recognition of the violent and unstable world that Faerie Land has become.

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Pastoral When Calidore returns to the narrative in Canto Nine, he abandons his quest because he has fallen in love with Pastorella and desires to live the simple life of a shepherd rather than the demanding life of a knight. He is the only knight to do this––although his behavior echoes that of the Redcrosse Knight, who was rather easily lured from his quest more than once by unsuitable women––and, given the nature of his task, there must surely be some sympathy among readers for his decision. But of course, when the shepherds are not protected by knights, all sorts of disasters can follow, especially in the increasingly frightening landscape of the poem. Inevitably, the shepherds are attacked and overrun by brigands. They lead Pastorella and her father Meliboe, the shepherd who has debated the nature of courtly and rural existence with Calidore, into captivity. Calidore rescues Pastorella, but Meliboe, who had advised Calidore to return to his quest in Canto Nine, is killed. Calidore unbalances the lives of the shepherds and destabilizes their world, as well as failing to provide them with protection from the everincreasing forces who wish them harm. Being more accomplished than his rural counterparts, he triumphs in all their games and contests; he then humiliates his rival for Pastorella’s affections, Coridon, as his skilled social courtesy undermines Coridon’s more homely abilities (an example of courtesy acting as its opposite, and of manners actually being rude). His linguistic skills always teeter on the brink of actually falsifying evidence and perhaps fatally undermining the virtue he represents, which requires him to tell the simple truth.

The Graces In Canto Ten, Calidore makes his most spectacularly unfortunate intervention into the pastoral world when he interrupts Colin Clout’s piping. Colin’s music has conjured the marvelous spectacle of the four Graces (Wind). Spenser’s representation of this event is a superb mixture of the sublime and the comic. Colin, who is an alter ego of the poet himself, has managed to produce this mystical vision of the classical Muses identified as Euphrosyne, Aglea, and Thalia––the three daughters of Zeus who represent beauty, charm, and joy. (As Spenser makes clear, they also display “all the complements of curtesie” [x.23.6].) But Colin has gone beyond even the most wonderful of Neoplatonic visions in conjuring up a mysterious fourth Grace. The poet then has the audacity to apologize to the queen for not having her as

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the fourth Grace and instead replacing her with his own wife, another Elizabeth. Colin says: “Sunne of the world, great glory of the sky, That all the earth doest lighten with thy rayes, Great Gloriana, greatest Majesty, Pardon thy shepheard, mongst so many layes, As he hath sung of thee in all his dayes, To make one minime of thy poore handmayd, And underneath thy feete to place her prayse, That when thy glory shall be farre displayd To future age of her this mention may be made.”

(x.28)

The supposed apology actually serves to draw attention to what Spenser is doing by replacing the queen with a “poore handmayd” in his characterization of the fourth Grace and, in doing so, shows us the way that the poem’s narrative is heading toward its conclusion in Book Six. The definitions of courtesy at the opening of the book debated whether the virtue was actually found in court or country. Here we have definite proof that the true value of courtesy is found in pastoral retreats and not at the court overseen by the queen. But we also learn the reason for possible confusion over the source of the virtue. It is not the rustic shepherds who represent the true essence of courtesy, but the figure of the poet, who is able to produce the mystical knowledge of poetry. Colin Clout may appear humble and unimpressive, but he has more knowledge and power than the hapless Knight of Courtesy. The verse cited above shows that the focus of the poem has moved from the figure of the monarch and her knights to that of the poet who produces representations of them. If he wishes to make his new wife more powerful than the queen in Faerie Land, then he has the power to do that. The false apology makes this point forcefully. Read more straightforwardly, the episode is a validation of the power of the poet as a creator whose ability to make things is at odds with the clumsy and inept behavior of courtiers. The latter, whatever their intentions, are shown to be deaf to the qualities of poetry and blind to the beauties of art. The political message of the poem, that the difficult problem of justice needs to be solved before culture can flourish, is now cleverly reinforced by the artistic vision. Art and politics are shown to be neatly and inextricably intertwined. The dance of the Graces, beautiful and elegant as it is, is haunted by the brutal image in Book Five of the poet, Bonfont, with his tongue nailed to a post (V.ix.25–6). The silenced poet is unable to advise the queen, so she fails to implement a sensible

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policy of reform. Therefore, her knights are incapable of recognizing the value of art when they find it, and so act as its destroyers when they should be its protectors. As a result, they never receive the benefits of a proper education from poetry, which––as Spenser’s contemporary Sir Philip Sidney pointed out––is a superior form of writing to history and philosophy, as it moves the reader to become more virtuous (Sidney). It is little wonder that time is out of joint in Book Six. The episode also reveals why Book Six is such a problematic and disturbing poem. If all values reside in the poet, then why is he such a marginalized figure? Again, Spenser draws our attention to this problem when he introduces Colin: “That jolly shepheard, which there piped, was / Poore Colin Clout (who knowes not Colin Clout?)” (x.16.3–4). The question is ironic and rhetorical, as the reader is unable to answer in the affirmative or negative. If Colin were properly rewarded and famous, he would not be an obscure poet appearing in the margins of the poem’s geography and toward the end of the narrative. The reader is clearly encouraged to reflect on Spenser’s own position at the periphery of Elizabeth’s dominions––even though he was not at all badly rewarded for his labors as a poet and servant of the Crown. More important, the episode requires us to think about the worth of poetry in fostering the serious values that civilized society requires, a message in line with all Elizabethan treatises on literature (Vickers). That Calidore and Colin are shown to be at odds is a forceful reminder that poetry and court life have become separated, a dangerous and problematic situation for all concerned. Colin first appeared in Spenser’s work in the January eclogue to his first major, published poem, The Shepheardes Calender (1579). Colin, modeled on Virgil’s Meliboeus in his first eclogue, is about to be exiled and laments his uncertain status. The fact that Colin is still the same unhappy, rustic figure so many works later gives us a sense of how little has changed in English literary history. Virgil moved on through the Georgics to the dynastic epic, the Aeneid. Spenser, writing a hybrid epic romance, ends his poem with Colin as he was before, a sign of a lack of progress and an indictment of the marginalized role of the poet (Burrow, 1993). Spenser is demonstrating that he knows best––that if his poem were read properly, then many of the mistakes that have been made could have been avoided. But is there any hope of this happening? After all, it is the Knight of Courtesy who makes the Graces disappear.

Violence Book Six is a notably violent work, a sign of how much and how rapidly society degenerates if justice is not properly instituted, and how savage

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the measures required to combat its ever stronger enemies must be in order to succeed in the short term. The first quest that each knight has faced in the previous books is usually one that serves to define the mission and that looks forward to the more difficult tasks to come. In many of the medieval romances on which The Faerie Queene is based, knights who kill other knights are shown to be in a state of sin, and the aim of any true knight is to avoid excessive slaughter (King). Calidore kills Maleffort in the first canto, and the book becomes more and more violent as it progresses (E. Fowler). In Canto Two, Calidore learns how the squire, Tristram, killed a knight who was abusing a lady; in Canto Three, the Blatant Beast wounds Serena, and Turpine injures Calepine; the evil giant threatens the childless Bruin and Mathilde in Canto Four; the Salvage Man kills many of Turpine’s followers in Canto Six; a knight is killed by Arthur and Turpine is hung up by his heels in Canto Seven; Serena is nearly eaten by cannibals in Canto Eight; the brigands abduct the shepherds in Canto Ten; they then kill the captive shepherds and many brigands are killed by Calidore in Canto Eleven. As the book continues, the shepherds are threatened more seriously by their enemies until their pastoral world is overrun by the savage cannibals and the brigands. Only then does Calidore return to his quest and defeat the Blatant Beast. We witness a confused and dysfunctional society that has no proper sense of the balance among its various elements. When Calidore debates the proper way to conduct life with Meliboe in Canto Nine, it is obvious that they are talking at cross purposes. Meliboe has a clear sense of the different roles that each element plays within the whole; he tries to tell Calidore that as a knight he needs to behave like a knight and that he cannot simply become a shepherd. For Meliboe, it “fittest is, that all contented rest / With that they hold” (ix.29.8–9), and he continues to argue that “It is the mynd, that maketh good or ill” (30.1). Calidore misunderstands what the shepherd means and interprets his words as implying that everyone can “fashion his owne lyfes estate” (31.2), which is not what Meliboe means at all. Meliboe is telling Calidore to return to his quest, whereas Calidore thinks that Meliboe is providing him with a simple anti-court message and telling him that he can be a shepherd if he wishes. The poem’s message is subtle: we cannot simply dismiss Calidore as a willful fool. It is hardly surprising that he does not want to continue with his quest, as it is so poorly defined and confusing. Anyone in his position would surely envy the apparently straightforward life of the shepherd. But the result of his decision is that Meliboe and his fellow shepherds are killed when they could have survived. The blame is not really with Calidore. Rather, it is his monarch who has failed to govern society as she should have done. It is not surprising that

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the world gets turned upside down when shepherds are wiser than courtly knights.

Savagery Book Six contains two very different versions of savagery, part of a debate continued throughout the published poem (Hadfield, 1997). Spenser makes it very clear that every virtue depends on an opposite vice: we cannot have a concept of courtesy or civility without an understanding of the nature of savagery. Courtesy should eventually subsume and absorb savagery. The process of transformation should not occur the other way around, but in the frightening world of Book Six, we cannot take the triumph of good for granted. Different versions of savagery, of course, connote different narratives of nature and culture. The innocent Salvage Man is blessed with instincts that are all good; he seeks to heal and nurture others even though he has limited powers of speech and reason. He has never yet experienced pity or gentleness, but he knows exactly what to do when he encounters such feelings (iv.3). He represents a benign state of nature, one that shows mankind degenerating into civility and gradually losing all noble instincts with the advance of culture. Or does he? Spenser cleverly undercuts his narrative by hinting that all is not quite what it seems and suggesting that the Salvage Man is a fiction within a fiction. At the start of the next canto, we are told that “he was borne of noble blood” (v.2.7) and that we will eventually be told the story of his origins. This would make him a changeling, like Pastorella, who is united with Calidore at the end of Book Six, or the Redcrosse Knight, who learns that he is St. George only toward the end of his quest. But the moment never comes; perhaps it was never intended. The point may actually be that the Salvage Man is not truly natural, but rather a creature who behaves well because of his civilized origins. Set against the Salvage Man are the Salvage Nation, who explicitly represent the opposite pole of nature (McNeir), as textual echoes demonstrate. The Salvage Man “neither plough’d nor sowed” (iv.14.7), and instead forages for the fruits of the forest. The Salvage Nation do not practice farming either, but they feed themselves in very different ways, raiding their neighbors’ lands to “serve their owne necessities with others need” (viii.35.9). While the Salvage Man had never tasted flesh or blood (iv.14.7–9), obeying the injunction of God to the sons of Noah after the Flood finally subsides (Gen. 9.4), the Salvage Nation are subsumed by the most shocking of appetites. They are depraved cannibals who represent all that is corrupt and limited in nature and has to be civilized:

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Thereto they usde one most accursed order, To eate the flesh of men, whom they mote fynde, And straungers to devoure, which on their border Were brought by errour, or by wreckfull wynde. A monstrous cruelty gainst course of kynde. (viii.36.1–5)

It is absolutely clear that the behavior of the Salvage Nation is meant to be read in terms of that of the Salvage Man. The later example forces us to rethink what we saw earlier and, perhaps, realize that benign versions of nature give way to hostile ones. Spenser’s portraits of primitive people mirror exactly those of early travelers to the Americas who found a striking mixture: friendly natives who lived in an abundant land and were eager to cooperate with strangers, and aggressive cannibals who represented the worst features of human nature (Hulme, Pagden). The pessimistic message of the poem seems to be that actually the savage portrayals are accurate and that mankind does need to be forcibly civilized––a message Spenser emphasizes throughout his prose tract, A View of the State of Ireland. Courtesy has to follow justice in this reading of human nature, as the former simply cannot be established without the latter. Yet again, however, Spenser’s poem is more sophisticated and subtle than this straightforward message might imply. Consider the following very disturbing verse, which has inspired much critical comment (Hadfield, 1996, introduction; McNeir). It represents Serena stretched out before the high priest of the Salvage Nation, as he prepares to sacrifice her: Her yvorie necke, her alablaster brest, Her paps, which like white silken pillowes were, For love in soft delight thereon to rest; Her tender sides her bellie white and clere, Which like an Altar did it selfe uprere, To offer sacrifice divine thereon; Her goodly thighes, whose glorie did appeare Like a triumphall Arch, and thereupon The spoiles of Princes hang’d, which were in battel won.

(viii.42)

Much could be written about this verse, which forces the reader to ask a series of difficult questions (particularly if we bear in mind that the episode is a rewriting of an earlier incident in I.vi, when Una found herself among the satyrs––one that showed a friendly but misguided primitive people worshipping her). On the one hand, we see Serena through the eyes of the Salvage Nation as they leer over the naked body of the captive

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girl. Yet, on the other, we cannot fail to note that the metaphors and references represent Serena in terms of the standard beauties of Elizabethan poetry, with their white skin (alabaster), breasts like silken pillows, and slender form. The technical term for such description is a blazon, a long-established form in the tradition of the European lyric, one that described a woman’s body from the head down to the feet. (The most celebrated example in English is John Donne’s deliberately bawdy “Elegy: On His Mistress Going to Bed.”) The reader sees Serena through familiar and unfamiliar eyes, each producing unsettling results: we imagine her simultaneously as an object of reverential sacrifice and as a passive and abused pornographic doll. The point may be that these ways of seeing are closer together than we would like to think, and that the civilized and the savage are also not so far apart. Spenser’s point is akin to that of Montaigne in his essay “On the Cannibals,” which Spenser may well have known even though it was not translated into English until 1603, after his death. Montaigne points out that the cannibals in the New World do eat each other, exactly as Europeans had always imagined that they would. However, such crimes seem inconsequential in comparison to those of Europeans, who slaughter each other on vast scales and with unspeakable cruelty in their wars of religion. The essay ends with a witty and subversive line, as if the author has suddenly remembered that he is really talking nonsense: “All that is not verie ill; but what of that? They weare no kind of breeches nor hosen” (Montaigne, I.229). Spenser’s description is a similar attempt to link the savagery of the New and Old Worlds as a common feature of humanity. We may find the violent and threatening world of Book Six frightening, but we need to remember that it is our world and our home. The Book concludes with one of Spenser’s key interventions into the poem, as he speaks––apparently, at least––in propria persona about the hostile reception that his work has generated. The Blatant Beast threatens to destroy the Faerie World that the poem has so carefully established in the six books, and further to derail the ambitions of the great English poet: Ne may this homely verse, of many meanest, Hope to escape his venemous despite, More then my former writs, all were they clearest From blamefull blot, and free from all that wite, With which some wicked tongues did it backebite, And bring into a mighty Peres displeasure, That never so deserved to endite. Therfore do you my rimes keep better measure, And seeke to please, that now is counted wisemens threasure. (xii.41)

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These lines deserve some extensive comment, as they are the last of The Faerie Queene published in Spenser’s lifetime. Do they serve as an adequate and deliberate conclusion to the poem, indicating that Spenser is aware that the project has gone as far as it can go? Or are they just an interim conclusion to the dark and bitter second edition, paving the way for the next installment that Spenser never wrote because he died prematurely (see Neuse; Stewart)? Or, perhaps, Spenser himself was not entirely sure at this moment. Certainly this stanza concludes the poem on a desperate note, with the forces of evil overwhelming those of good as the Blatant Beast’s assault on language itself threatens to make The Faerie Queene a redundant enterprise, its attempt to civilize its readers nullified by poor political judgment and a hostility to the work of poets. The mighty peer is generally assumed to be William Cecil, Lord Burghley (1520–1598), whom Spenser offended in Mother Hubberds Tale and The Ruins of Time, each poem included in the volume of Complaints (1591) (although some have argued that Mother Hubberds Tale circulated in manuscript somewhat earlier, probably in 1580; Peterson; Greenlaw, 1932). But, as is so often the case in Spenser, the local context of the episode is simply the starting point, and we swiftly move from the hostility of a powerful statesman to a sense that language itself is under threat. If the reader has not already realized, the lines refer us back to the definitions of courtesy at the start of the book, reminding us that proper courtesy is right speech. Here the Beast is shown to triumph, an indication of the impotence of the virtue at a time when civilized values are under threat. The paradox the poem articulates is that, without the harshness of justice, civilization cannot be established, so that attempts to further civility only lead to disaster and remind us of the sort of action that is required. The times require brutal and savage government to defeat powerful and dangerous opponents, and, as this has not been achieved in Book Five, the Knight of Courtesy has no chance of victory. His quest is rendered meaningless.

2. Book Seven, “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie” Mysterious Text Book Seven of The Faerie Queene, a fragment also published as “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie,” will probably always remain something of a mystery. It was published a decade after Spenser’s death in 1609, by the publisher Matthew Lownes, who had inherited the rights to Spenser’s works from William Ponsonby, along with his business (Burrow, 1996, 41). It is likely that Lownes found the two-plus cantos that make up Book Seven

Introduction

xix

among Ponsonby’s papers. What is striking about these cantos, published as Cantos Six and Seven of Book Seven, is that they look very different from equivalent sections of other books, a contrast that raises a series of questions. Do they survive exactly as the author intended them? Or has the publisher assumed that they would have been Cantos Six and Seven of the unfinished––or lost––book? Why were they not published in Spenser’s lifetime? Had he simply not finished Book Seven, or was he afraid of a reaction to them if they were ever published? Were the verses ever planned to be part of The Faerie Queene, or was it truly finished in the published form of 1596? Perhaps the last question may be easiest to answer first. Spenser probably had good reason to fear the reception he would receive. He had already offended Lord Burghley (see above, p. xviii), and then inspired the wrath of James VI of Scotland through his portrait of James’ mother, Mary Queen of Scots, as Duessa––represented elsewhere in the poem as the Whore of Babylon (McCabe, 1987). Spenser was granted a pension by Elizabeth after the publication of the first edition of The Faerie Queene (February 25, 1591), but the queen would probably have been less than amused by the representation of her in “The Two Cantos of Mutabilitie”: Even you faire Cynthia, whom so much ye make Joves dearest darling, she was bred and nurst On Cynthus hill, whence she her name did take: Then is she mortall borne, how-so ye crake; Besides, her face and countenance every day We changed see, and sundry forms partake, Now hornd, now round, now bright, now brown and gray: So that as changefull as the Moone men use to say. (vii.50.2–9)

The verse serves two interrelated functions. It stands as a comment on Elizabeth’s capriciousness and inconstancy in the 1590s, and what many of her subjects perceived as her inability to rule effectively (Guy). It is also a memento mori, bluntly informing the aging Elizabeth that she, too, is subject to the ravages of time and mutability, and that her inability to face such basic issues of life and death has cost her subjects dearly. The fear of these sentiments reaching a wider audience may have inspired a rare note of caution in Spenser––although there are verses in the Epithalamion that might be construed as equally subversive of the queen’s dignity (Hadfield, 2008). The more obvious answer, however, is that the Book was left unfinished at Spenser’s death. We will probably never know whether these were left in manuscript as Cantos Six, Seven, and Eight of Book Seven. It is unlikely that a printer

xx

Introduction

would have inserted such numbers into the text without any authorization, as it would surely have been more natural to suggest that they were meant to be Cantos One, Two, and Three. But if they were as the poet left them, then they seem oddly out of place in the scheme of the longer poem, bearing very little resemblance to the equivalent cantos in earlier books and indicating a radical and sudden change of narrative direction. Reading them another way, we might assume that the cantos were a work in progress when Spenser died, as most scholars generally conclude that they are a late work, postdating the published version of The Faerie Queene.

Myth The cantos stand as an etiological myth (a myth of origins) that underlies the poem and that explain the meaning, location, and purpose of Spenser’s Faerie Land. Mutabilitie challenges Cynthia, the goddess chosen by Jove to rule the universe he has conquered. She claims that she has the real right to be queen, as things change endlessly according to her desire. It is agreed that Jove and Mutabilitie will present their cases before Nature on Arlo Hill, the small mountain nearest to Spenser’s house in Ireland. Before the judgment––an event that looks back to the debate of the birds in Chaucer’s Parliament of Fowls––takes place, Spenser narrates the mythological story of Ireland’s history. Ireland used to be the fairest of the British Isles, which attracted the attention of Diana. She spent a great deal of her time there, bathing and hunting with her nymphs and satyrs. The foolish god Faunus had an uncontrollable desire to see the goddess naked and so persuaded her nymph, Molanna, to let him know where Diana bathed. Hiding in the bushes, he was so overwhelmed with emotion that he burst out laughing, inspiring the wrath of the goddess, who cursed the island and never returned, thereby condemning it to its current, miserable state. In Canto Seven, the protagonists meet on Arlo Hill and make their respective cases. Jove argues that he has conquered the universe and established order, so he rules by right; Mutabilitie counters that she should rule, as her powers actually control the universe, whatever Jove might claim. Nature decides in little time to award victory to Jove, then vanishes. The fragment concludes with two stanzas of the “unperfite” eighth canto, which seem to suggest that constancy is the principle underlying the universe––not perpetual change. These debates are important, as our answers to the questions posed will determine how we read the verse. Some readers, placing greater emphasis on the concluding stanzas that form a fragment of Canto Eight, see them as a metaphysical affirmation of order in the universe, after the

Introduction

xxi

efforts of Mutabilitie to argue an alternative case have been exposed as false by Nature. Others, tending to place more emphasis on the Irish location of the poem, read the cantos as the desperate work of a besieged man, who feels that the universe is rapidly descending into chaos (A. Fowler; Coughlan; Lethbridge; Zitner; Teskey, 1993). Most are in agreement that the “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie” are among the finest poetic achievements of The Faerie Queene. As in Book Six, Spenser makes it hard for the reader to separate political and aesthetic judgments. The ostensible meaning of the cantos, that constancy triumphs over change, would appear to be undercut in a variety of ways. On a simple narrative level, we witness Jove ruling as a conqueror, a detail that undermines a calm sense of certainty and order. If we apply our knowledge of the myth of Jove, we remember that Jove ruled because he overthrew his father, Saturn, before being unsuccessfully challenged by the Titans––again, a message that undermines the apparent confidence of the closing lines of the cantos. The myth of Jove appears at key points in The Faerie Queene, most importantly, perhaps, at the start of Book Five: after we are told of Jove’s victory over Saturn, his sword, Chrysaor––used to defeat the Titans––is passed on to Artegall, the Knight of Justice (V.i.9). Jove is explicitly associated with rebellion and the problematic nature of establishing order over chaos. Furthermore, Jove is associated with the failures of Artegall’s quest and the vacillations of the Faerie Queen, who recalls Artegall before his quest has been successfully completed, hardly a sign of untroubled rule.

Politics At a political level, as politics were of immediate concern to Spenser in 1598 when his estate was overrun and he was forced to flee to London, the message of the cantos is equally bleak. Cynthia, as “The Letter to Raleigh” appended to the first edition of the poem makes clear, is Elizabeth. Given the challenge to her dominions, that may establish Mutabilitie as a figure of Mary Queen of Scots, taking over the mantle of Duessa (Hadfield, 2004). Mary was, of course, dead by this point, having been executed in 1587. Her son, James VI, was likely to inherit the English throne, which suggests that Spenser was thinking in terms of the Stuart succession and an unholy alliance, as he saw it, between the Scots and the Irish against the English. Cynthia’s decision to abandon Ireland and allow it to become the worst, rather than the best, of the British Isles must reflect badly on Elizabeth. The implication is that, disgusted by what she found in Ireland and the hostility of the population to her rule, she retreated to London and left Ireland to its own devices. This reinforces the

xxii

Introduction

conclusion to Book Five, renewing the sense that the queen has failed her people by not realizing that Ireland must be conquered and rendered docile if the British Isles are to prosper. Read against such topical and allegorical narratives, the conclusion that Mutabilitie is defeated by Nature’s words seems extremely doubtful. Furthermore, the sense of peaceful order in the last lines of Canto Eight is doubtful: Then gin I thinke on that which Nature sayd, Of that same time when no more Change shall be, But stedfast rest of all things firmely stayd Upon the pillours of Eternity, That is contrayr to Mutabilitie: For, all that moveth, doth in Change delight: But thence-forth all shall rest eternally With Him that is the God of Sabbaoth hight: O! thou great Sabbaoth God, grant me that Sabaoths sight.

(viii.2)

Can we really believe that these are the final words of the poem? There is an apocalyptic sense that time will eventually end, but perhaps not now; or, if the end of the world is nigh, then a great deal of pain will come before the postapocalyptic peace. The cantos can be read as a battle between what Spenser and the reader might want––order and stability––and what might really be the case: that chaos and disorder actually might triumph. Writing in 1598—assuming that this dating is correct—Spenser would have been terrified of the imminent threat from the Catholic forces, which looked as though they would overrun Ireland and ally with the son of the executed, traitorous Catholic queen from Scotland. Soon after his death the following year, the Irish and Spanish were defeated at the Battle of Kinsale (1601) and the forces of order ascended. After Elizabeth’s death (1603), James proved to be far less dangerous than many had anticipated, and he signed a peace treaty with Spain in 1604. Had Spenser lived another five years––after all, he would only have been about fifty––he might well have revised The Faerie Queene again.

Title page to the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23082)

TO THE MOST HIGH, MIGHTIE And MAGNIFICENT EMPRESSE RENOVVMED FOR PIETIE, VERTVE, AND ALL GRATIOVS GOVERNMENT ELIZABETH BY THE GRACE OF GOD QVEENE OF ENGLAND FRAVNCE AND IRELAND AND OF VIRGINIA, DEFENDOVR OF THE FAITH, &c. HER MOST HVMBLE SERVAVNT EDMVND SPENSER DOTH IN ALL HVMILITIE DEDICATE, PRESENT AND CONSECRATE THESE HIS LABOVRS TO LIVE VVITH THE ETERNITIE OF HER FAME.

THE SIXTE BOOKE OF THE FAERIE QVEENE.

Contayning, THE LEGEND OF S. CALIDORE OR

OF COVRTESIE. 1

The waies, through which my weary steps I guyde, In this delightfull land of Faery, Are so exceeding spacious and wyde, And sprinckled with such sweet variety, Of all that pleasant is to eare or eye, That I nigh ravisht1 with rare thoughts delight, My tedious travell2 doe forget thereby; And when I gin to feele decay of might, It strength to me supplies, and chears my dulled spright.3

2

Such secret comfort, and such heavenly pleasures, Ye sacred imps, that on Parnasso4 dwell, And there the keeping have of learnings threasures,5 Which doe all worldly riches farre excell, Into the mindes of mortall men doe well,6 And goodly fury7 into them infuse; Guyde ye my footing,8 and conduct me well In these strange waies, where never foote did use,9 Ne none can find, but who was taught them by the Muse.

3

Revele to me the sacred noursery10 Of vertue, which with you doth there remaine, Where it in silver bowre11 does hidden ly

1

6

ravisht: implies that the narrator is overwhelmed by sensations and is not in control of his thoughts. 2 travell: work, as well as journey. 3 spright: spirit. 4 imps: the Muses; Parnasso: Parnassus Hill, where the Muses were reputed to live. 5 threasures: treasures.

well: surge. fury: poetic inspiration. 8 footing: a pun on treading and writing poetry. 9 use: habitually go. 10 noursery: nursery garden. 11 silver bowre: where the angels live. Cynthia also lives in a silver bower (VII.vi. 18.7). 7

3

4

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

From view of men, and wicked worlds disdaine. Since it at first was by the Gods with paine Planted in earth, being deriv’d at furst From heavenly seedes of bounty soveraine,1 And by them long with carefull labour nurst, Till it to ripenesse grew, and forth to honour burst. 4

Amongst them all growes not a fayrer flowre, Then is the bloosme of comely courtesie,2 Which though it on a lowly stalke doe bowre,3 Yet brancheth forth in brave4 nobilitie, And spreds it selfe through all civilitie:5 Of which though present age doe plenteous seeme,6 Yet being matcht with plaine Antiquitie, Ye will them all but fayned showes esteeme, Which carry colours faire, that feeble eies misdeeme.7

5

But in the triall8 of true curtesie, Its now so farre from that, which then it was,9 That it indeed is nought but forgerie, Fashion’d to please the eies of them, that pas,10 Which see not perfect things but in a glas:11 Yet is that glasse so gay,12 that it can blynd The wisest sight, to thinke gold that is bras.13 But vertues seat is deepe within the mynd, And not in outward shows, but inward thoughts defynd.

1

bounty soveraine: ruling virtue. comely courtesie: the first definition of courtesy in the poem, possibly derived from 1 Pet. 3.8, which also suggests that courtesy is a lowly but important virtue: “Finally, be ye all of one mind: one suffer with another: love as brethren: be pitiful: be courteous.” (All biblical citations are from the 1568 Geneva Bible.) 3 bowre: live, exist. 4 brave: magnificent, splendid. 5 civilitie: civilization, civilized behavior. 6 seeme: a key word in Spenser. All appears well, but things may not be quite what they seem, as the subsequent lines demonstrate. 2

7

eies: eyes; misdeeme: confuse, mistake. triall: the use of a legal word looks forward to the trial of Mutabilitie and Jove in Book Seven. Note also the use of “defynd” (line 9). 9 I.e., courtesy now means something that is very different from what it once meant. 10 pas: look carelessly, skate over important detail. 11 glas: mirror. Perhaps another biblical reference to the famous line in 1 Cor. 13.12: “For now we see as through a glasse darkely.” 12 gay: bright, brilliant, disguising and confusing the darkness of our sight. 13 bras: brass. 8

Proem

6

But where shall I in all Antiquity So faire a patterne finde, where may be seene The goodly praise of Princely curtesie, As in your selfe, O soveraine Lady Queene,1 In whose pure minde, as in a mirrour sheene,2 It showes, and with her brightnesse doth inflame The eyes of all, which thereon fixed beene;3 But meriteth indeede an higher name: Yet so from low to high uplifted is your name.4

7

Then pardon me, most dreaded Soveraine, That from your selfe I doe this vertue bring, And to your selfe doe it returne againe: So from the Ocean all rivers spring, And tribute backe repay as to their King. Right so from you all goodly vertues well5 Into the rest, which round about you ring,6 Faire Lords and Ladies, which about you dwell, And doe adorne your Court, where courtesies excell.7

1

Queene: the reference to “Antiquity” makes the verse ambiguous. Spenser may be praising Elizabeth’s court as equal to the best of antiquity, or he may be undermining her by praising Gloriana as representative of the virtues that the modern world lacks. 2 sheene: bright, clear; a pointed contrast to the mirror in the previous stanza. 3 Suggesting a dazzling display that obscures as much as it illuminates (see the use of “ravisht” in stanza 1).

5

4 name: in line 8, “name” means “title” or “calling”; in line 9, it refers to the name of Elizabeth. 5 well: flow. 6 ring: perhaps looking forward to the Graces, who dance in a ring in Canto Ten. 7 The poet now implies that courtesy derives from the court, countering what is stated in stanza 4 and demonstrating how complex and contradictory the concept of courtesy is.

Canto One Calidore saves from Maleffort, A Damzell used vylde:1 Doth vanquish Crudor, and doth make Briana wexe2 more mylde.

1

Of Court it seemes, men Courtesie doe call,3

For that it there most useth4 to abound; And well beseemeth that in Princes hall That vertue should be plentifully found, Which of all goodly manners is the ground,5 And roote of civill conversation.6 Right so in Faery court it did redound,7 Where curteous Knights and Ladies most did won8 Of all on earth, and made a matchlesse paragon. 2

But mongst them all was none more courteous Knight, Then Calidore,9 beloved over all, In whom it seemes, that gentlenesse of spright And manners mylde were planted naturall;10 To which he adding comely guize11 withall, And gracious speach, did steale mens hearts away.12

1

8

used vylde: abused. wexe: grow. 3 Courtesie doe call: a definition that follows from the comments in the last stanza of the Proem, suggesting that definitions of the virtue––and, by implication, of other key words––may not be fixed. 4 most useth: i.e., most commonly. 5 ground: foundation. 6 civill conversation: civilized behavior and proper discussion. 7 redound: flourish.

most did won: displayed the most courteous behavior. 9 Calidore: from two Greek words meaning “good” and “gift.” 10 It is significant that Calidore’s virtue is said to be natural, given the debate over nature and culture throughout Book Six. 11 comely guize: attractive appearance. 12 This suggests great oratorical skill, but may also hint that Calidore’s arguments often seem better than they really are––perhaps a criticism of the court and courtiers.

2

6

Canto One

7

Nathlesse thereto he was full stout and tall,1 And well approv’d in batteilous affray,2 That him did much renowme, and far his fame display. 3

Ne was there Knight, ne was there Lady found In Faery court, but him did deare embrace, For his faire usage and conditions sound,3 The which in all mens liking gayned place, And with the greatest purchast greatest grace: 4 Which he could wisely use, and well apply, To please the best, and th’evill to embase. For he loathd leasing,5 and base flattery, And loved simple truth and stedfast honesty.

4

And now he was in travell6 on his way, Uppon an hard adventure sore bestad,7 Whenas by chaunce he met uppon a day With Artegall, returning yet halfe sad From his late conquest, which he gotten had. Who whenas8 each of other had a sight, They knew them selves, and both their persons rad:9 When Calidore thus first; “Haile noblest Knight Of all this day on ground, that breathen living spright.10

5

“Now tell, if please you, of the good successe, Which ye have had in your late enterprize.” To whom Sir Artegall gan to expresse His whole exploite, and valorous emprize,11 In order as it did to him arize. “Now happy man” (sayd then Sir Calidore)

1

stout and tall: well formed and muscular. 2 batteilous affray: fighting. 3 conditions sound: solid virtues. 4 purchast: achieved; grace: good opinion. 5 loathd leasing: hated lying. Perhaps there is another hint of a contradiction here, given the power of Calidore’s verbal

skills, which please everyone––especially the best. 6 in travell: troubled. 7 sore bestad: hard pressed. 8 whenas: when. 9 rad: knew, recognized, read. 10 spright: spirit, person. 11 emprize: adventure, enterprise.

8

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

“Which have so goodly, as ye can devize,1 Atchiev’d so hard a quest, as few before; That shall you most renowmed make for evermore. 6

“But where ye ended have, now I begin To tread an endlesse trace,2 withouten guyde, Or good direction, how to enter in, Or how to issue forth in waies untryde, In perils strange, in labours long and wide,3 In which although good Fortune me befall, Yet shall it not by none be testifyde.”4 “What is that quest” (quoth then Sir Artegall) “That you into such perils presently doth call?”

7

“The Blattant Beast”5 (quoth he) “I doe pursew, And through the world incessantly doe chase, Till I him overtake, or else subdew: Yet know I not or how, or in what place To find him out, yet still I forward trace.”6 “What is that Blattant Beast?” (then he replide). “It is a Monster bred of hellishe race,” (Then answerd he) “which often hath annoyd Good Knights and Ladies true, and many else destroyd.

8

“Of Cerberus7 whilome he was begot, And fell Chimaera8 in her darkesome den, Through fowle commixture of his filthy blot;9

1

devize: describe. Calidore, recognizing a true knight, addresses Artegall according to his rank. 2 trace: path, track. 3 Calidore’s comments show how daunting he finds the quest assigned to him. His words indicate that he feels lost in a labyrinth. 4 testifyde: witnessed. Calidore is afraid that no one is watching what he is doing, and that his labors have no purpose (which might imply that he does not fully understand the proper meaning of courtesy and wants praise as much as he wants to do good).

5

Blattant Beast: from the Latin (and then English) “blatter,” meaning to babble or speak without proper control; this establishes the Beast as the enemy of the proper speech that Calidore utters as the Knight of Courtesy. The name also suggests loud, random noise. Spenser’s usage is the first recorded in the Oxford English Dictionary. 6 trace: travel. 7 Cerberus: Pluto’s three-headed dog, who guarded the gates to Hell. 8 Chimaera: a monster with three heads: those of a lion, a goat, and a dragon. 9 commixture: cross-breeding; blot: blemish, stain. The Blatant Beast is the offspring

Canto One

9

Where he was fostred long in Stygian fen,1 Till he to perfect ripenesse grew, and then Into this wicked world he forth was sent, To be the plague and scourge of wretched men: Whom with vile tongue and venemous intent He sore doth wound, and bite, and cruelly torment.” 9

“Then since the salvage Island2 I did leave” Sayd Artegall, “I such a Beast did see, The which did seeme a thousand tongues to have, That all in spight and malice did agree, With which he bayd and loudly barkt at mee, As if that he attonce would me devoure. But I that knew my selfe from perill free, Did nought regard his malice nor his powre, But he the more his wicked poyson forth did poure.”

10 “That surely is that Beast” (saide Calidore) “Which I pursue, of whom I am right glad To heare these tidings, which of none afore Through all my weary travell I have had:3 Yet now some hope your words unto me add.” “Now God you speed”4 (quoth then Sir Artegall) “And keepe your body from the daunger drad: For ye have much adoe to deale withall,” So both tooke goodly leave, and parted severall.5 11 Sir Calidore thence travelled not long, When as by chaunce a comely Squire he found, That thorough some more mighty enemies wrong, Both hand and foote unto a tree was bound: Who seeing him from farre, with piteous sound

of two triple-headed beasts, each perversions of nature. They have produced an even more perverse monstrosity. 1 Stygian fen: dark and gloomy lands by the river Styx, one of the rivers in Hell. 2 salvage Island: Artegall leaves the Salvage Island at V.xii.28. The Island is a transparent allegory of Ireland.

3

Calidore is weary of his quest before the book begins, a pointed contrast to the Redcrosse Knight’s naive enthusiasm at the start of Book One and a sign of how much the poem has changed since its opening. 4 God you speed: God grant you success; a common greeting. 5 parted severall: went their separate ways.

10

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Of his shrill cries him called to his aide. To whom approching, in that painefull stound1 When he him saw, for no demaunds he staide,2 But first him losde,3 and afterwards thus to him saide. 12 “Unhappy Squire, what hard mishap thee brought Into this bay4 of perill and disgrace? What cruell hand thy wretched thraldome wrought, And thee captyved in this shamefull place?” To whom he answerd thus; “My haplesse case Is not occasiond through my misdesert,5 But through misfortune, which did me abase Unto this shame, and my young hope subvert, Ere that I in her guilefull traines6 was well expert. 13 “Not farre from hence, uppon yond rocky hill, Hard by a streight7 there stands a castle strong, Which doth observe a custome lewd8 and ill, And it hath long mayntaind with mighty wrong:9 For may no Knight nor Lady passe along That way, (and yet they needs must passe that way,) By reason of the streight, and rocks among, But they that Ladies lockes doe shave away, And that knights berd10 for toll, which they for passage pay.” 14 “A shamefull use as ever I did heare,” Sayd Calidore, “and to be overthrowne. But by what meanes did they at first it reare, And for what cause, tell if thou have it knowne.” Sayd then that Squire: “The Lady which doth owne This Castle, is by name Briana11 hight.

1

stound: situation, plight. no demaunds he staide: he didn’t ask him any questions. 3 losde: loosed. 2

4

Into this bay: into this humiliating situation. 5 misdesert: transgression, own fault. 6 traines: snares. 7 streight: narrow path.

8

lewd: wicked. The castle that houses the evil knight is a familiar romance motif. 10 berd: humiliate by pulling their beards. The castle manifests the first abuse of courtesy that Calidore has to confront. 11 Briana: meaning piercing or shrill voice. Again, a pointed contrast to the measured and proper speech demanded by the rules of courtesy. 9

Canto One

Then which a prouder Lady liveth none: She long time hath deare lov’d a doughty Knight, And sought to win his love by all the meanes she might. 15 “His name is Crudor,1 who through high disdaine And proud despight of his selfe pleasing mynd, Refused hath to yeeld her love againe,2 Untill a Mantle she for him doe fynd, With beards of Knights and locks of Ladies lynd. Which to provide, she hath this Castle dight,3 And therein hath a Seneschall4 assynd, Cald Maleffort, a man of mickle5 might, Who executes her wicked will, with worse despight.6 16 “He this same day, as I that way did come With a faire Damzell, my beloved deare, In execution of her lawlesse doome,7 Did set uppon us flying both for feare: For little bootes8 against him hand to reare. Me first he tooke, unhable to withstond; And whiles he her pursued every where, Till his returne unto this tree he bond: Ne wote9 I surely, whether her he yet have fond.” 17 Thus whiles they spake, they heard a ruefull10 shrieke Of one loud crying, which they streight way ghest, That it was she, the which for helpe did seeke. Tho looking up unto the cry to lest,11 They saw that Carle from farre, with hand unblest12 Hayling13 that mayden by the yellow heare, That all her garments from her snowy brest, And from her head her lockes he nigh did teare, Ne would he spare for pitty, nor refraine for feare. 1

Crudor: cruel, rude; not just lacking in refinement, but primitive and basic. 2 againe: in return. 3 dight: built. 4 Seneschall: steward. 5 Maleffort: evil work; mickle: significant. 6 despight: malice; i.e., worse than Crudor.

7

doome: decree. bootes: gains. 9 wote: knew. 10 ruefull: pitiful. 11 lest: find, detect. 12 Carle: churl; unblest: wicked. 13 Hayling: pulling. 8

11

12

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

18 Which haynous sight when Calidore beheld, Eftsoones1 he loosd that Squire, and so him left, With hearts dismay and inward dolour queld,2 For to pursue that villaine, which had reft3 That piteous spoile by so injurious theft.4 Whom overtaking, loude to him he cryde; “Leave faytor quickely that misgotten weft5 To him, that hath it better justifyde, And turne thee soone to him, of whom thou art defyde.”6 19 Who hearkning to that voice, him selfe upreard, And seeing him so fiercely towardes make, Against him stoutly ran, as nought afeard, But rather more enrag’d for those words sake; And with sterne count’naunce thus unto him spake. “Art thou the caytive,7 that defyest me, And for this Mayd, whose party thou doest take, Wilt give thy beard, though it but little bee? Yet shall it not her lockes for raunsome fro me free.”8 20 With that he fiercely at him flew, and layd On hideous strokes with most importune9 might, That oft he made him stagger as unstayd,10 And oft recuile to shunne his sharpe despight.11 But Calidore, that was well skild in fight, Him long forbore, and still his spirite spar’d,12 Lying in waite, how him he damadge might. But when he felt him shrinke, and come to ward,13 He greater grew, and gan to drive at him more hard.

1

Eftsoones: immediately. dolour queld: fear suppressed. 3 reft: seized. 4 It is not clear whether Maleffort has stolen the maiden or just her hair. 2

5

faytor: villain; weft: stolen goods. 6 Calidore states that the youth has a better legal claim to the property (the maiden) than Maleffort and demands that he return her. 7 caytive: villain.

8

The lack of respect and courtesy demonstrated in this episode is clear and, as with all first tests of knights in the poem, does not appear to present the protagonist with too many problems.

9

importune: heavy, severe. unstayd: unstable. 11 recuile: recoil; despight: anger. 12 forbore: resisted; his spirite spar’d: i.e., did not use all of his strength. 13 come to ward: fight defensively. 10

Canto One

13

21 Like as a water streame, whose swelling sourse Shall drive a Mill, within strong bancks is pent,1 And long restrayned of his ready course; So soone as passage is unto him lent, Breakes forth, and makes his way more violent. Such was the fury of Sir Calidore,2 When once he felt his foeman to relent;3 He fiercely him pursu’d, and pressed sore, Who as he still decayd, so he encreased more.4 22 The heavy burden of whose dreadfull might When as the Carle no longer could sustaine, His heart gan faint, and streight he tooke his flight Toward the Castle, where if need constraine, His hope of refuge used to remaine. Whom Calidore perceiving fast to flie, He him pursu’d and chaced through the plaine, That he for dread of death gan loude to crie Unto the ward,5 to open to him hastilie. 23 They from the wall him seeing so aghast, The gate soone opened to receive him in, But Calidore did follow him so fast, That even in the Porch he him did win, And cleft his head asunder to his chin. The carkasse tumbling downe within the dore, Did choke the entraunce with a lumpe of sin,6 That it could not be shut, whilest Calidore Did enter in, and slew the Porter on the flore.7 1

pent: enclosed. The fury of Calidore shows what lies just below the surface of the courteous knight, who has the capacity to act with extreme force if necessary. The description recalls Guyon’s destruction of Acrasia’s bower in II.xii.83, indicating that courtesy has absorbed and gone beyond temperance as a virtue. Spenser’s poem often works by referring back to earlier episodes; it shows that virtue can be taught and is a cumulative process. 3 relent: weaken, hold back. 2

4

I.e., Maleffort decays and Calidore increases in strength. Spenser often leaves the antecedents of his pronouns ambiguous. 5 ward: guard. 6 lumpe of sin: the description recalls Arthur’s killing of two knights outside Geryoneo’s castle (V.x.36–7). The reader is left in no doubt either that the application of courtesy requires violent action, or that Calidore is not really a good representative of the virtue. The latter is perhaps because Calidore lives in confusing and troubled times and so is unsure what his role should be. 7 flore: ground.

14

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

24 With that the rest, the which the Castle kept, About him flockt, and hard at him did lay; But he them all from him full lightly swept, As doth a Steare, in heat of sommers day, With his long taile the bryzes1 brush away. Thence passing forth, into the hall he came, Where of the Lady selfe in sad dismay He was ymett, who with uncomely shame Gan him salute, and fowle upbrayd with faulty blame.2 25 “False traytor Knight,” (sayd she) “no Knight at all, But scorne of armes that hast with guilty hand Murdred my men, and slaine my Seneschall; Now comest thou to rob my house unmand, And spoile3 my selfe, that can not thee withstand? Yet doubt thou not, but that some better Knight Then thou, that shall thy treason understand, Will it avenge, and pay thee with thy right: And if none do, yet shame shal thee with shame requight.” 26 Much was the Knight abashed at that word; Yet answerd thus; “Not unto me the shame, But to the shamefull doer it afford.4 Bloud is no blemish; for it is no blame To punish those, that doe deserve the same; But they that breake bands of civilitie, And wicked customes make, those doe defame Both noble armes and gentle curtesie. No greater shame to man then inhumanitie.5 27 “Then doe your selfe, for dread of shame, forgoe This evill manner,6 which ye here maintaine, And doe in stead thereof mild curt’sie showe 1

bryzes: flies. The language, especially the use of “fowle,” suggests that she is unfairly attacking Calidore. However, his violent actions may well disturb the reader, too. 3 spoile: rape. 4 afford: attach. 2

5

Calidore is expressing the central dilemma of those who seek to defend what they regard as civilized virtues from savage attack. In the process of defending right, they may be forced to adopt the methods of their enemies and risk undermining the good they seek to defend. This is one of the key problems posed throughout The Faerie Queene. 6 manner: behavior, custom.

Canto One

15

To all, that passe. That shall you glory gaine More then his love, which thus ye seeke t’obtaine.” Wherewith all full of wrath, she thus replyde; “Vile recreant, know that I doe much disdaine Thy courteous lore,1 that doest my love deride, Who scornes thy ydle scoffe, and bids thee be defyde.” 28 “To take defiaunce at a Ladies word” (Quoth he) “I hold it no indignity; But were he2 here, that would it with his sword Abett, perhaps he mote it deare aby.”3 “Cowherd”4 (quoth she) “were not, that thou wouldst fly, Ere he doe come, he should be soone in place.” “If I doe so,” (sayd he) “then liberty I leave to you, for aye me to disgrace With all those shames, that erst ye spake me to deface.”5 29 With that a Dwarfe she cald to her in hast, And taking from her hand a ring of gould, A privy6 token, which betweene them past, Bad him to flie with all the speed he could, To Crudor, and desire him that he would Vouchsafe to reskue her against a Knight, Who through strong powre had now her self in hould,7 Having late slaine her Seneschall in fight, And all her people murdred with outragious might. 30 The Dwarfe his way did hast, and went all night; But Calidore did with her there abyde8 The comming of that so much threatned Knight, Where that discourteous Dame with scornfull pryde, And fowle entreaty him indignifyde,9 That yron heart it hardly could sustaine: 1

courteous lore: courteous wisdom. I.e., a knight who opposes Calidore and behaves with lack of courtesy––in this case, Crudor. 3 Abett: support; aby: pay a penalty, suffer. 4 Cowherd: a pun on “coward” and “cow herd.” Briana is equating rank and behavior in a simplistic manner; this is especially no2

table given the discussion of the origins of courtesy in the Proem. 5 erst: earlier; deface: attack, belittle. 6 privy: private. 7 in hould: captive. 8 abyde: wait. 9 entreaty: treatment; indignifyde: humiliated.

16

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Yet he, that could his wrath full wisely guyde, Did well endure her womanish disdaine, And did him selfe from fraile impatience refraine. 31 The morrow next, before the lampe of light, Above the earth upreard his flaming head, The Dwarfe, which bore that message to her knight, Brought aunswere backe, that ere he tasted bread, He would her succour,1 and alive or dead Her foe deliver up into her hand: Therefore he wild2 her doe away all dread; And that of him she mote assured stand, He sent to her his basenet,3 as a faithfull band. 32 Thereof full blyth4 the Lady streight became, And gan t’augment5 her bitternesse much more: Yet no whit more appalled for the same, Ne ought dismayed was Sir Calidore,6 But rather did more chearefull seeme therefore. And having soone his armes about him dight,7 Did issue forth, to meete his foe afore; Where long he stayed not, when as a Knight He spide come pricking8 on with al his powre and might. 33 Well weend9 he streight, that he should be the same, Which tooke in hand her quarrell to maintaine; Ne stayd to aske if it were he by name, But coucht his speare, and ran at him amaine.10 They bene ymett in middest of the plaine, With so fell fury, and dispiteous11 forse, That neither could the others stroke sustaine, But rudely rowld to ground both man and horse, Neither of other taking pitty nor remorse.

1

7

2

8

succour: help. wild: willed, commanded. 3 basenet: helmet. 4 blyth: happy. 5 t’augment: to increase. 6 I.e., Calidore was not worried or frightened by this.

dight: gathered, displayed. pricking: galloping; recalls the opening line of the poem: “A gentle knight was pricking on the plaine” (I.i.1.1). 9 weend: understood. 10 amaine: immediately. 11 dispiteous: ruthless.

Canto One

17

34 But Calidore uprose againe full light, Whiles yet his foe lay fast in sencelesse sound,1 Yet would he not him hurt, although he might: For shame he weend a sleeping wight2 to wound. But when Briana saw that drery stound,3 There where she stood uppon the Castle wall, She deem’d him sure to have bene dead on ground, And made such piteous mourning therewithall, That from the battlements she ready seem’d to fall. 35 Nathlesse at length him selfe he did upreare4 In lustlesse wise,5 as if against his will, Ere he had slept his fill, he wakened were, And gan to stretch his limbs; which feeling ill Of his late fall, a while he rested still: But when he saw his foe before in vew, He shooke off luskishnesse,6 and courage chill Kindling a fresh, gan battell to renew, To prove if better foote then horsebacke would ensew. 36 There then began a fearefull cruell fray Betwixt them two, for maystery of might. For both were wondrous practicke7 in that play, And passing8 well expert in single fight, And both inflam’d with furious despight:9 Which as it still encreast, so still increast Their cruell strokes and terrible affright;10 Ne once for ruth their rigour they releast,11 Ne once to breath a while their angers tempest ceast. 37 Thus long they trac’d and traverst12 to and fro, And tryde all waies, how each mote entrance make Into the life of his malignant foe;

1

sound: swoon, faint. weend: thought; wight: person. 3 drery stound: bloody stroke. 4 upreare: get up. 5 lustlesse wise: feeble manner. 6 luskishnesse: torpor. 7 practicke: experienced. 2

8

passing: surpassing. despight: anger. 10 affright: frightening appearance. 11 ruth: pity; releast: moderated. 12 trac’d and traverst: in dueling, thrusting and then feinting. 9

18

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

They hew’d their helmes, and plates1 asunder brake, As they had potshares2 bene; for nought mote slake Their greedy vengeaunces, but goary blood, That at the last like to a purple lake Of bloudy gore congeal’d about them stood, Which from their riven sides forth gushed like a flood.3 38 At length it chaunst,4 that both their hands on hie, At once did heave, with all their powre and might, Thinking the utmost of their force to trie, And prove the finall fortune of the fight: But Calidore, that was more quicke of sight, And nimbler handed, then his enemie, Prevented5 him before his stroke could light, And on the helmet smote him formerlie,6 That made him stoupe to ground with meeke humilitie.7 39 And ere he could recover foot againe, He following that faire advantage fast, His stroke redoubled with such might and maine, That him upon the ground he groveling cast; And leaping to him light, would have unlast8 His Helme, to make unto his vengeance way. Who seeing, in what daunger he was plast, Cryde out, “Ah mercie Sir, doe me not slay, But save my life, which lot9 before your foot doth lay.” 40 With that his mortall hand a while he stayd, And having somewhat calm’d his wrathfull heat With goodly patience, thus he to him sayd; 1

plates: plates of armor. potshares: shards of broken pottery. 3 Descriptions of bloody battles between knights occur frequently in the romances that Spenser is following in the poem, notably Thomas Malory’s Le Morte D’Arthur. 4 chaunst: that Calidore’s victory seems to be the product of chance suggests how far the world of the poem is from a simple, ordered universe. Spenser seems already to be looking toward the uncertainty of the Mutabilitie Cantos. 2

5

Prevented: anticipated. formerlie: first. 7 It is worth noting how long it takes Calidore to defeat Crudor––in many ways an obviously discourteous villain—and how close the fight is. This is a significant change from the Redcrosse Knight’s easy victory over Error in I.i, and shows how much harder the world now seems to the knights. 8 unlast: unlaced. 9 lot: fortune. 6

Canto One

19

“And is the boast of that proud Ladies threat, That menaced me from the field to beat, Now brought to this? By this now may ye learne, Strangers no more so rudely to intreat,1 But put away proud looke, and usage sterne,2 The which shal nought to you but foule dishonor yearne.3 41 “For nothing is more blamefull to a knight, That court’sie doth as well as armes professe, How ever strong and fortunate in fight, Then the reproch of pride and cruelnesse. In vaine he seeketh others to suppresse,4 Who hath not learnd him selfe first to subdew: All flesh is frayle, and full of ficklenesse, Subject to fortunes chance, still chaunging new; What haps to day to me, to morrow may to you. 42 “Who will not mercie unto others shew, How can he mercy ever hope to have?5 To pay each with his owne is right and dew.6 Yet since ye mercie now doe need to crave, I will it graunt, your hopelesse life to save; With these conditions, which I will propound: First, that ye better shall your selfe behave Unto all errant knights, whereso on ground; Next that ye Ladies ayde in every stead and stound.”7 43 The wretched man, that all this while did dwell In dread of death, his heasts8 did gladly heare, And promist to performe his precept well, And whatsoever else he would requere. So suffring him to rise, he made him sweare By his owne sword, and by the crosse thereon,

1

intreat: treat. sterne: cruel. 3 yearne: earn. 4 suppresse: subdue, defeat. 5 See James 2.13: “For there shall bee judgement mercilesse to him that sheweth 2

no mercy, and mercie rejoyceth against judgement.” 6 See Rom. 13.7: “Give to all men therefore their duetie.” 7 every stead and stound: everywhere and at any time. 8 heasts: commands.

20

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

To take Briana for his loving fere,1 Withouten dowre or composition;2 But to release3 his former foule condition. 44 All which accepting, and with faithfull oth Bynding himselfe most firmely to obay, He up arose, how ever liefe or loth,4 And swore to him true fealtie for aye.5 Then forth he cald from sorrowfull dismay The sad Briana, which all this beheld: Who comming forth yet full of late affray,6 Sir Calidore upcheard, and to her teld7 All this accord, to which he Crudor had compeld. 45 Whereof she now more glad, then sory earst,8 All overcome with infinite affect,9 For his exceeding courtesie, that pearst Her stubborne hart with inward deepe effect, Before his feet her selfe she did project,10 And him adoring as her lives deare Lord, With all due thankes, and dutifull respect, Her selfe acknowledg’d bound for that accord, By which he had to her both life and love restord. 46 So all returning to the Castle glad, Most joyfully she them did entertaine, Where goodly glee and feast to them she made, To shew her thankefull mind and meaning faine,11 By all the meanes she mote12 it best explaine: And after all, unto Sir Calidore She freely gave that Castle for his paine, And her selfe bound to him for evermore; So wondrously now chaung’d, from that she was afore.13 1

fere: wife. composition: financial settlement. 3 release: give up. 4 liefe or loth: willing or unwilling. 5 aye: ever. 6 affray: fright, terror. 7 upcheard: encouraged; teld: told. 2

8

earst: before. affect: gratitude. 10 project: throw. 11 meaning faine: good intention. 12 mote: might. 13 Briana now becomes a model of courtesy. 9

Canto One

47 But Calidore himselfe would not retaine Nor land nor fee, for hyre of his good deede, But gave them streight unto that Squire againe, Whom from her Seneschall he lately freed, And to his damzell as their rightfull meed,1 For recompence of all their former wrong: There he remaind with them right well agreed, Till of his wounds he wexed2 hole and strong, And then to his first quest he passed forth along.

1

meed: reward.

2

wexed: grew.

21

Canto Two Calidore sees young Tristram slay A proud discourteous knight, He makes him Squire, and of him learnes his state and present plight.

1

What vertue is so fitting for a knight, Or for a Ladie, whom a knight should love, As Curtesie, to beare themselves aright To all of each degree, as doth behove?1 For whether they be placed high above, Or low beneath, yet ought they well to know Their good, that none them rightly may reprove Of rudenesse, for not yeelding what they owe:2 Great skill it is such duties timely to bestow.

2

Thereto great helpe dame Nature selfe doth lend: For some so goodly gratious are by kind,3 That every action doth them much commend, And in the eyes of men great liking find; Which others, that have greater skill in mind, Though they enforce4 themselves, cannot attaine. For everie thing, to which one is inclin’d, Doth best become, and greatest grace doth gaine: Yet praise likewise deserve good thewes, enforst with paine.5

1

3

The question of degree is a crucial social dimension of courtesy. Should society be organized on a strict hierarchical basis? Or does the evidence of Book Six suggest otherwise? The reader, following the definitions from the opening of the book, is asked to weigh the evidence. 2 I.e., all people should behave according to their station and rank, and acknowledging those of others.

kind: nature. enforce: exert. 5 thewes: manners, habits. Lines 7 through 9 claim that things one is inclined to do are likely to be done well and gain praise; however, things that cause an individual great pain and effort, such as good manners, also deserve recognition. 4

22

Canto Two

3

That well in courteous Calidore appeares, Whose every act and deed, that he did say, Was like enchantment,1 that through both the eyes, And both the eares did steale the hart away. He now againe is on his former way, To follow his first quest, when as he spyde A tall young man from thence not farre away, Fighting on foot, as well he him descryde,2 Against an armed knight, that did on horsebacke ryde.

4

And them beside a Ladie faire he saw, Standing alone on foot, in foule array:3 To whom himselfe he hastily did draw, To weet the cause of so uncomely fray,4 And to depart5 them, if so be he may. But ere he came in place, that youth had kild That armed knight, that low on ground he lay; Which when he saw, his hart was inly child With great amazement, and his thought with wonder fild.

5

Him stedfastly he markt, and saw to bee A goodly youth of amiable grace, Yet but a slender slip, that scarse did see Yet seventeene yeares, but tall and faire of face That sure he deem’d him borne of noble race.6 All in a woodmans jacket he was clad Of lincolne greene, belayd7 with silver lace; And on his head an hood with aglets8 sprad, And by his side his hunters horne he hanging had.

6

Buskins he wore of costliest cordwayne,9 Pinckt upon gold, and paled part per part,10

1 Again, Calidore is shown to be persuasive and impressive, perhaps blinding everyone to his limitations and the fact that he has no real idea of what he is doing. 2 descryde: perceived, discovered. 3 foule array: soiled clothing. 4 weet: know; fray: chaos. 5 depart: separate. 6 As so often, the reader is asked to consider whether appearances mean what they seem

23

and whether noble birth is the most important aspect of character. 7 lincolne greene: the color worn by Robin Hood and his men; belayd: adorned. 8 aglets: spangles. 9 cordwayne: a type of Spanish leather. 10 Pinckt upon gold: the design is perforated to reveal the gold layer underneath; paled part per part: striped throughout.

24

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

As then the guize was for each gentle swayne;1 In his right hand he held a trembling2 dart, Whose fellow he before had sent apart; And in his left he held a sharpe borespeare,3 With which he wont to launch4 the salvage hart Of many a Lyon, and of many a Beare That first unto his hand in chase did happen neare. 7

Whom Calidore a while well having vewed, At length bespake; “what meanes this, gentle swaine? Why hath thy hand too bold it selfe embrewed5 In blood of knight, the which by thee is slaine, By thee no knight; which armes impugneth plaine?”6 “Certes”7 (said he) “loth were I to have broken The law of armes; yet breake it should againe, Rather then let my selfe of wight be stroken,8 So long as these two armes were able to be wroken.9

8

“For not I him as this his Ladie here May witnesse well, did offer first to wrong, Ne surely thus unarm’d I likely were; But he me first, through pride and puissance strong Assayld, not knowing what to armes doth long.”10 “Perdie11 great blame,” (then said Sir Calidore) “For armed knight a wight unarm’d to wrong. But then aread, thou gentle12 chyld, wherefore Betwixt you two began this strife and sterne uprore.”

9

“That shall I sooth”13 (said he) “to you declare. I whose unryper yeares are yet unfit For thing of weight, or worke of greater care,

1

guize: style, fashion; swayne: youth. trembling: quivering. 3 borespeare: a spear for hunting boars, with a crosspiece to prevent the user from being gored. 4 launch: pierce. 5 embrewed: stained. 6 This clearly violates the laws of arms. The squire is too junior to be allowed to fight knights. 7 Certes: indeed. 2

8

stroken: struck. wroken: avenged. 10 long: belong. The dead knight is actually the one who has violated the laws of arms by attacking an unarmed man. 11 Perdie: indeed. 12 aread: tell; gentle: i.e., noble. Calidore assumes that Tristram is of aristocratic birth. 13 sooth: truthfully. 9

Canto Two

25

Doe spend my dayes, and bend my carelesse1 wit To salvage chace, where I thereon may hit In all this forrest, and wyld wooddie raine:2 Where, as this day I was enraunging3 it, I chaunst to meete this knight, who there lyes slaine, Together with this Ladie, passing on the plaine. 10 “The knight, as ye did see, on horsebacke was, And this his Ladie, (that him ill became,) On her faire feet by his horse side did pas Through thicke and thin, unfit for any Dame. Yet not content, more to increase his shame, When so she lagged, as she needs mote so, He with his speare, that was to him great blame, Would thumpe her forward, and inforce to goe, Weeping to him in vaine, and making piteous woe. 11 “Which when I saw, as they me passed by, Much was I moved in indignant mind, And gan to blame him for such cruelty Towards a Ladie, whom with usage kind He rather should have taken up behind. Wherewith he wroth, and full of proud disdaine, Tooke in foule scorne, that I such fault did find, And me in lieu thereof 4 revil’d againe, Threatning to chastize me, as doth t’a chyld pertaine. 12 “Which I no lesse disdayning, backe returned His scornefull taunts unto his teeth againe, That he streight way with haughtie choler5 burned, And with his speare strooke me one stroke or twaine; Which I enforst to beare though to my paine, Cast6 to requite, and with a slender dart, Fellow of this I beare, throwne not in vaine, Strooke him, as seemeth, underneath the hart, That through7 the wound his spirit shortly did depart.” 1

6

2

7

carelesse: carefree. wooddie raine: woodland realm. 3 enraunging: roaming through. 4 in lieu thereof: in return. 5 choler: anger.

Cast: determined. through: referring to the belief that the spirit did leave the body and ascend to heaven.

26

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

13 Much did Sir Calidore admyre his speach Tempred1 so well, but more admyr’d the stroke That through the mayles2 had made so strong a breach Into his hart, and had so sternely wroke3 His wrath on him, that first occasion broke.4 Yet rested not, but further gan inquire Of that same Ladie, whether what he spoke, Were soothly so, and that th’unrighteous ire Of her owne knight, had given him his owne due hire.5 14 Of all which, when as she could nought deny, But cleard that stripling of th’imputed blame, Sayd then Sir Calidore; “neither will I Him charge with guilt, but rather doe quite clame:6 For what he spake, for you he spake it, Dame; And what he did, he did him selfe to save: Against both which that knight wrought knightlesse shame. For knights and all men this by nature have, Towards all womenkind them kindly to behave. 15 “But sith that he is gone irrevocable, Please it you Ladie, to us to aread,7 What cause could make him so dishonourable, To drive you so on foot unfit to tread, And lackey8 by him, gainst all womanhead?” “Certes Sir knight” (sayd she) “full loth I were To rayse a lyving blame against the dead: But since it me concernes, my selfe to clere, I will the truth discover, as it chaunst whylere.9 16 “This day, as he and I together roade Upon our way, to which we weren bent,10 We chaunst to come foreby a covert11 glade 1

Tempred: governed, controlled. mayles: chain mail. 3 wroke: avenged. 4 that first occasion broke: i.e., started the fight. 5 hire: reward. 6 quite clame: acquit. 2

7

aread: declare. lackey: act as a servant. 9 discover: reveal; chaunst whylere: happened recently. 10 bent: heading. 11 foreby: close to; covert: secret. The forest is a place of passion and confusion in romance. 8

Canto Two

27

Within a wood, whereas a Ladie gent1 Sate with a knight in joyous jolliment, Of their franke loves, free from all gealous spyes: Faire was the Ladie sure, that mote content An hart, not carried with too curious2 eyes, And unto him did shew all lovely courtesyes.3 17 “Whom when my knight did see so lovely faire, He inly gan her lover to envy, And wish, that he part of his spoyle might share. Whereto when as my presence he did spy To be a let,4 he bad me by and by For to alight: but when as I was loth,5 My loves owne part to leave so suddenly, He with strong hand down from his steed me throw’th, And with presumpteous powre against that knight streight go’th. 18 “Unarm’d all was the knight, as then more meete6 For Ladies service,7 and for loves delight, Then fearing any foeman there to meete: Whereof he taking oddes, streight bids him dight8 Himselfe to yeeld his love, or else to fight. Whereat the other starting up dismayd, Yet boldly answer’d, as he rightly might; To leave his love he should be ill apayd,9 In which he had good right gaynst all, that it gainesayd.10 19 “Yet since he was not presently in plight11 Her to defend, or his12 to justifie, He him requested, as he was a knight, To lend him day his better right to trie, Or stay till he his armes, which were thereby,

1

6

2

7

gent: gentle. curious: enquiring. The sardonic comment of the lady is one of Spenser’s many humorous moments. 3 courtesyes: the word clearly has a debased and vulgar meaning in this context. 4 let: hindrance. 5 loth: reluctant.

meete: suitable. The state of the lovers becomes more clear as the lady’s story continues. 8 oddes: advantage; dight: prepare. 9 apayd: repaid. 10 gainesayd: opposed. 11 plight: state. 12 his: i.e., his right, claim.

28

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Might lightly1 fetch. But he was fierce and whot, Ne time would give, nor any termes aby,2 But at him flew, and with his speare him smot; From which to thinke to save himselfe, it booted3 not. 20 “Meane while his Ladie, which this outrage saw, Whilest they together for the quarrey4 strove, Into the covert did her selfe withdraw, And closely hid her selfe within the grove. My knight hers soone, as seemes, to daunger drove And left sore wounded: but when her he mist, He woxe halfe mad, and in that rage gan rove And range through all the wood, where so he wist5 She hidden was, and sought her so long, as him list. 21 “But when as her he by no meanes could find, After long search and chauff,6 he turned backe Unto the place, where me he left behind: There gan he me to curse and ban,7 for lacke Of that faire bootie, and with bitter wracke8 To wreake on me the guilt of his owne wrong. Of all which I yet glad to beare the packe,9 Strove to appease him, and perswaded long: But still his passion grew more violent and strong. 22 “Then as it were t’avenge his wrath on mee, When forward we should fare, he flat refused To take me up (as this young man did see) Upon his steed, for no just cause accused, But forst to trot on foot, and foule misused, Pounching me with the butt end of his speare, In vaine complayning, to be so abused. For he regarded neither playnt10 nor teare, But more enforst my paine, the more my plaints to heare.

1

6

2

7

lightly: easily. aby: agree. 3 booted: mattered. 4 quarrey: prey; a term from hunting. 5 wist: knew.

chauff: rage. ban: insult. 8 wracke: vengeance. 9 packe: burden. 10 playnt: plea, complaint.

Canto Two

29

23 “So passed we, till this young man us met, And being moov’d with pittie of my plight, Spake, as was meet, for ease of my regret:1 Whereof befell, what now is in your sight.” “Now sure” (then said Sir Calidore) “and right Me seemes, that him befell by his owne fault: Who ever thinkes through confidence of might, Or through support of count’nance proud and hault2 To wrong the weaker, oft falles in his owne assault.” 24 Then turning backe unto that gentle boy, Which had himselfe so stoutly well acquit; Seeing his face so lovely sterne and coy,3 And hearing th’answeres of his pregnant wit, He praysd it much, and much admyred it; That sure he weend4 him borne of noble blood, With whom those graces did so goodly fit:5 And when he long had him beholding stood, He burst into these words, as to him seemed good. 25 “Faire gentle swayne, and yet as stout6 as fayre, That in these woods amongst the Nymphs dost wonne,7 Which daily may to thy sweete lookes repayre,8 As they are wont unto Latonaes sonne,9 After his chace on woodie Cynthus donne:10 Well may I certes such an one thee read,11 As by thy worth thou worthily hast wonne, Or surely borne of some Heroicke sead, That in thy face appeares and gratious goodlyhead.

1

regret: sorrow. count’nance: appearance; hault: proud. 3 coy: modest. 4 weend: knew. Once again, the connection is made between birth and nobility. 5 Prefiguring the actual appearance of the Graces in Canto Ten, which links courtesy to poetry. 6 stout: brave. 7 wonne: dwell. 2

8

repayre: look back, stare. Latonaes sonne: Apollo. 10 Cynthus donne: Cynthus hill, where Apollo and Diana were born. The location is referred to again at VII.vii.50.4. Apollo roamed around the mountain. 11 read: judge, with a reference to reading that relates the quest of Calidore to that of the poem’s reader. 9

30

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

26 “But should it not displease thee it to tell; (Unlesse thou in these woods thy selfe conceale, For love amongst the woodie Gods to dwell;)1 I would thy selfe require thee to reveale, For deare affection and unfayned zeale,2 Which to thy noble personage I beare, And wish thee grow in worship and great weale.3 For since the day that armes I first did reare,4 I never saw in any greater hope appeare.” 27 To whom then thus the noble youth; “may be Sir knight, that by discovering my estate,5 Harme may arise unweeting6 unto me; Nathelesse, sith ye so courteous seemed late, To you I will not feare it to relate. Then wote ye that I am a Briton borne,7 Sonne of a King, how ever thorough fate Or fortune I my countrie have forlorne,8 And lost the crowne, which should my head by right adorne. 28 “And Tristram9 is my name, the onely heire Of good king Meliogras10 which did rayne In Cornewale, till that he through lives despeire Untimely dyde, before I did attaine Ripe yeares of reason, my right to maintaine.11 After whose death, his brother seeing mee

1

Calidore means that virtue must be on display and not hidden. 2 unfayned zeale: genuine devotion. 3 worship: honor; weale: well-being. 4 reare: raise. 5 estate: rank, social position. The suggestion here is that social position and birth may or may not be aligned. 6 unweeting: unknown. 7 Briton borne: this links Tristram to the Redcrosse Knight, Arthur, Artegall, and Britomart, as well as to all humans, but not fairies. 8 forlorne: left, abandoned.

9

Tristram: one of the chief Arthurian Knights; he first appears in Chrétien de Troyes’ Arthurian Romances as a naive but good-hearted Welsh knight from the forests, whose quest is to find the Holy Grail. Spenser does not make much significant connection to the story of Tristram. 10 Meliogras: Spenser adapts Thomas Malory’s version of the story of Tristram in Le Morte D’Arthur (VIII.1–2). Tristram’s mother dies while giving birth to him, and his father remarries, resenting his son. Tristram leaves home after his stepmother tries to poison him and he saves her life; the episode causes his father considerable grief. 11 right to maintaine: independence.

Canto Two

31

An infant, weake a kingdome to sustaine, Upon him tooke the royall high degree, And sent me, where him list,1 instructed for to bee. 29 “The widow Queene my mother, which then hight Faire Emiline, conceiving then great feare Of my fraile safetie, resting in the might Of him, that did the kingly Scepter beare, Whose gealous dread induring not a peare,2 Is wont to cut off all, that doubt3 may breed, Thought best away me to remove somewhere Into some forrein land, where as no need Of dreaded daunger might his doubtfull4 humor feed. 30 “So taking counsell of a wise man red,5 She was by him adviz’d, to send me quight Out of the countrie, wherein I was bred, The which the fertile Lionesse6 is hight, Into the land of Faerie, where no wight Should weet of me, nor worke me any wrong. To whose wise read7 she hearkning, sent me streight Into this land, where I have wond8 thus long, Since I was ten yeares old, now growen to stature strong. 31 “All which my daies I have not lewdly9 spent, Nor spilt the blossome of my tender yeares In ydlesse, but as was convenient,10 Have trayned bene with many noble feres11 In gentle thewes, and such like seemely leres.12 Mongst which my most delight hath alwaies been, To hunt the salvage chace amongst my peres, Of all that raungeth in the forrest greene; Of which none is to me unknowne, that ev’r was seene.13 1

where him list: where he liked. induring not a peare: not tolerating a rival. 3 doubt: danger. 4 doubtfull: suspicious. 5 red: known. 6 Lionesse: the legendary land between Land’s End and the Scilly Islands. 7 read: advice. 2

8

wond: lived. lewdly: wastefully. 10 convenient: right. 11 feres: companions. 12 thewes: lessons; leres: lessons. 13 Tristram is shown to have a natural virtue and an ability to survive in harmony with the natural world. 9

32

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

32 “Ne is there hauke, which mantleth1 her on pearch, Whether high towring, or accoasting2 low, But I the measure of her flight doe search, And all her pray, and all her diet know. Such be our joyes, which in these forrests grow: Onely the use of armes, which most I joy, And fitteth most for noble swayne to know, I have not tasted3 yet, yet past a boy, And being now high time these strong joynts to imploy. 33 “Therefore, good Sir, sith now occasion fit Doth fall, whose like hereafter seldome may, Let me this crave, unworthy though of it, That ye will make me Squire without delay, That from henceforth in batteilous array I may beare armes, and learne to use them right; The rather since that fortune hath this day Given to me the spoile of this dead knight, These goodly gilden4 armes, which I have won in fight.” 34 All which when well Sir Calidore had heard, Him much more now, then earst he gan admire, For the rare hope which in his yeares appear’d, And thus replide; “faire chyld, the high desire To love of armes, which in you doth aspire, I may not certes without blame denie; But rather wish, that some more noble hire,5 (Though none more noble then is chevalrie,) I had, you to reward with greater dignitie.” 35 There him he causd to kneele, and made to sweare Faith to his knight, and truth to Ladies all, And never to be recreant,6 for feare Of perill, or of ought that might befall: So he him dubbed, and his Squire did call. Full glad and joyous then young Tristram grew,

1

4

2

5

mantleth: rests. accoasting: swooping down to the ground. 3 tasted: experienced.

gilden: gilded. hire: task, work. 6 recreant: villainous, wicked.

Canto Two

33

Like as a flowre, whose silken leaves small,1 Long shut up in the bud from heavens vew, At length breakes forth, and brode displayes his smyling hew.2 36 Thus when they long had treated3 to and fro, And Calidore betooke him to depart, Chyld4 Tristram prayd, that he with him might goe On his adventure, vowing not to start,5 But wayt on him in every place and part. Whereat Sir Calidore did much delight, And greatly joy’d at his so noble hart, In hope he sure would prove a doughtie knight: Yet for the time this answere he to him behight.6 37 “Glad would I surely be, thou courteous Squire, To have thy presence in my present quest, That mote thy kindled courage set on fire, And flame forth honour in thy noble brest: But I am bound by vow, which I profest To my dread Soveraine, when I it assayd,7 That in atchievement of her high behest,8 I should no creature joyne unto mine ayde, For thy9 I may not graunt, that ye so greatly prayde. 38 “But since this Ladie is all desolate,10 And needeth safegard now upon her way, Ye may doe well in this her needfull state To succour her, from daunger of dismay; That thankfull guerdon11 may to you repay.” The noble ympe of such new service fayne,12 It gladly did accept, as he did say. So taking courteous leave, they parted twayne, And Calidore forth passed to his former payne.13 1

6

2

7

See the metaphor for courtesy at Pr.4. hew: face, appearance. 3 treated: discussed matters, conversed. 4 Chyld: youth, young knight (used in literary texts). We are given the sense that Tristram is growing rapidly in these few stanzas and his development is being telescoped for us to witness. 5 start: flee, desert his master.

behight: said. dread: powerful; assayd: agreed, planned. 8 behest: command. 9 For thy: therefore. 10 desolate: alone, abandoned. 11 guerdon: reward. 12 fayne: glad. 13 payne: toil, labor, as well as pain.

34

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

39 But Tristram then despoyling that dead knight Of all those goodly implements of prayse,1 Long fed his greedie eyes with the faire sight Of the bright mettall, shyning like Sunne rayes; Handling and turning them a thousand wayes. And after having them upon him dight,2 He tooke that Ladie, and her up did rayse Upon the steed of her owne late dead knight, So with her marched forth, as she did him behight.3 40 There to their fortune leave we them awhile, And turne we backe to good Sir Calidore; Who ere he thence had traveild many a mile, Came to the place, whereas ye heard afore This knight, whom Tristram slew, had wounded sore Another knight in his despiteous pryde; There he that knight found lying on the flore,4 With many wounds full perilous and wyde, That all his garments, and the grasse in vermeill dyde. 41 And there beside him sate upon the ground His wofull Ladie, piteously complayning With loud laments that most unluckie stound,5 And her sad selfe with carefull hand constrayning6 To wype his wounds, and ease their bitter payning. Which sorie sight when Calidore did vew With heavie eyne, from teares uneath7 refrayning, His mightie hart their mournefull case can rew,8 And for their better comfort to them nigher drew.

1

implements of prayse: i.e., armor, the show of which should express a knight’s rank and achievements. That Tristram is taking the armor of another suggests that this means of judging knights is not necessarily accurate; it is commonplace in Arthurian romance that knights appear disguised––most notably Lancelot, the best knight in the world.

2

dight: placed, worn. behight: instruct. 4 flore: ground. 5 stound: time. 6 constrayning: attempting, with the implication of applying considerable force. 7 uneath: with difficulty. 8 rew: pity. 3

Canto Two

35

42 Then speaking to the Ladie, thus he sayd: “Ye dolefull Dame, let not your griefe empeach1 To tell, what cruell hand hath thus arayd2 This knight unarm’d, with so unknightly breach Of armes, that if I yet him nigh may reach, I may avenge him of so foule despight.” The Ladie hearing his so courteous speach, Gan reare3 her eyes as to the chearefull light, And from her sory hart few heavie words forth sight.4 43 In which she shew’d, how that discourteous knight (Whom Tristram slew) them in that shadow5 found, Joying together in unblam’d delight,6 And him unarm’d, as now he lay on ground, Charg’d with his speare and mortally did wound, Withouten cause, but onely her to reave7 From him, to whom she was for ever bound: Yet when she fled into that covert greave,8 He her not finding, both them thus nigh dead did leave. 44 When Calidore this ruefull9 storie had Well understood, he gan of her demand, What manner wight he was, and how yclad,10 Which had this outrage wrought with wicked hand. She then, like as she best could understand, Him thus describ’d, to be of stature large, Clad all in gilden armes, with azure band Quartred athwart, and bearing in his targe A Ladie on rough waves, row’d in a sommer barge.11

1

7

2

8

empeach: prevent. arayd: afflicted. 3 reare: raise. 4 sight: sighed. 5 shadow: shady grove. 6 unblam’d delight: blameless pleasure. The reference may be slightly ironic, especially if the reader remembers that it was when he was unarmed and cavorting with Duessa that the Redcrosse Knight was attacked and defeated (I.vii).

reave: separate. greave: grove. 9 ruefull: sad. 10 wight: person; yclad: clothed. 11 barge: a small rowing boat. A heraldic description. The knight has a quartered pattern on his body armor, with a picture of a lady in high seas on his shield, which suggests that he is not a man who can be trusted to look after women.

36

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

45 Then gan Sir Calidore to ghesse streight way By many signes, which she described had, That this was he, whom Tristram earst did slay, And to her said; “Dame be no longer sad: For he, that hath your Knight so ill bestad, Is now him selfe in much more wretched plight; These eyes him saw upon the cold earth sprad, The meede of his desert for that despight,1 Which to your selfe he wrought, and to your loved knight. 46 “Therefore faire Lady lay aside this griefe, Which ye have gathered to your gentle hart, For that displeasure;2 and thinke what reliefe Were best devise for this your lovers smart,3 And how ye may him hence, and to what part Convay to be recur’d.”4 She thankt him deare, Both for that newes he did to her impart, And for the courteous care, which he did beare Both to her love; and to her selfe in that sad dreare.5 47 Yet could she not devise by any wit, How thence she might convay him to some place. For him to trouble she it thought unfit, That was a straunger to her wretched case; And him to beare, she thought it thing too base.6 Which when as he perceiv’d, he thus bespake; “Faire Lady let it not you seeme disgrace, To beare this burden on your dainty backe; My selfe will beare a part, coportion of your packe.”

1

meede: reward; despight: crime. displeasure: offense. 3 smart: pain. 4 recur’d: healed. 2

5

dreare: miserable condition. Another of Spenser’s dirty jokes. The literal sense is that she is afraid that, by placing him above her, she slides too far down the social ladder. 6

Canto Two

48 So off he did his shield, and downeward layd Upon the ground, like to an hollow beare;1 And powring balme, which he had long purvayd,2 Into his wounds, him up thereon did reare,3 And twixt them both with parted paines4 did beare, Twixt life and death, not knowing what was donne. Thence they him carried to a Castle neare, In which a worthy auncient Knight did wonne: Where what ensu’d, shall in next Canto be begonne.

1

beare: bier. We are reminded––immediately after a reference to sex and therefore life––how close to death we all are. 2 purvayd: provided, kept.

3 4

reare: raise. parted paines: shared labor.

37

Canto Three Calidore brings Priscilla home, Pursues the Blatant Beast: Saves Serena whilest Calepine By Turpine is opprest.

1

True is, that whilome that good Poet1 sayd, The gentle minde by gentle deeds is knowne. For a man by nothing is so well bewrayd,2 As by his manners, in which plaine is showne Of what degree and what race he is growne. For seldome seene, a trotting Stalion get An ambling Colt, that is his proper owne: So seldome seene, that one in basenesse set Doth noble courage shew, with curteous manners met.3

2

But evermore contrary hath bene tryde,4 That gentle bloud will gentle manners breed;5 As well may be in Calidore descryde,6 By late ensample of that courteous deed, Done to that wounded Knight in his great need, Whom on his backe he bore, till he him brought Unto the Castle where they had decreed.7 There of the Knight, the which that Castle ought,8 To make abode that night he greatly was besought.

3

He was to weete a man of full ripe yeares, That in his youth had beene of mickle9 might, And borne great sway in armes amongst his peares:

designed to lead and provoke the reader, to sum up what has been seen so far, or to be taken as ironic. 6 descryde: revealed. 7 decreed: decided. 8 ought: owned. 9 mickle: great.

1

Chaucer, who is one of Spenser’s key influences. 2 bewrayd: betrayed, revealed. 3 courage: nature; met: united. 4 tryde: demonstrated. 5 The words of Spenser’s narrator do not have to be taken at face value; they may be

38

Canto Three

39

But now weake age had dimd his candle light. Yet was he courteous still to every wight,1 And loved all that did to armes incline, And was the father of that wounded Knight, Whom Calidore thus carried on his chine,2 And Aldus was his name, and his sonnes Aladine.3 4

Who when he saw his sonne so ill bedight,4 With bleeding wounds, brought home upon a Beare, By a faire Lady, and a straunger Knight, Was inly touched with compassion deare,5 And deare affection of so dolefull dreare,6 That he these words burst forth; “Ah sory7 boy, Is this the hope that to my hoary8 heare Thou brings? aie me, is this the timely joy, Which I expected long, now turnd to sad annoy?9

5

“Such is the weakenesse of all mortall hope; So tickle10 is the state of earthly things, That ere they come unto their aymed scope, They fall too short of our fraile reckonings, And bring us bale and bitter sorrowings, In stead of comfort, which we should embrace: This is the state of Keasars and of Kings. Let none therefore, that is in meaner place, Too greatly grieve at any his unlucky case.”

6

So well and wisely did that good old Knight Temper his griefe, and turned it to cheare, To cheare his guests, whom he had stayd11 that night, And make their welcome to them well appeare: That to Sir Calidore was easie geare;12 But that faire Lady would be cheard for nought,

1

6

2

7

wight: person. chine: back. 3 Aldus: old, old knight; Aladine: like Aldus, meaning as Aldus was as a young knight. 4 ill bedight: afflicted. 5 deare: heartfelt.

affection: feeling; dreare: pity, sorrow. sory: poor. 8 hoary: old, white. 9 annoy: grief. 10 tickle: uncertain, inconstant. 11 stayd: asked to stay. 12 geare: matter.

40

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

But sigh’d and sorrow’d for her lover deare, And inly did afflict her pensive thought, With thinking to what case1 her name should now be brought. 7

For she was daughter to a noble Lord, Which dwelt thereby, who sought her to affy2 To a great pere; but she did disaccord,3 Ne could her liking to his love apply, But lov’d this fresh young Knight, who dwelt her ny, The lusty4 Aladine, though meaner borne, And of lesse livelood and hability, Yet full of valour, the which did adorne His meanesse much, and make her th’others riches scorne.5

8

So having both found fit occasion, They met together in that luckelesse glade; Where that proud Knight in his presumption The gentle Aladine did earst invade,6 Being unarm’d, and set in secret shade. Whereof she now bethinking, gan t’advize,7 How great a hazard she at earst had made Of her good fame, and further gan devize, How she the blame might salve with coloured disguize.8

9

But Calidore with all good courtesie Fain’d9 her to frolicke, and to put away The pensive fit of her melancholie; And that old Knight by all meanes did assay,10 To make them both as merry as he may. So they the evening past, till time of rest,

1 2

case: situation, condition.

affy: betrothe. 3 disaccord: withhold consent. 4 lusty: young, handsome. 5 These lines contradict what the narrator stated at the start of the canto. 6 earst invade: attack recently. 7 bethinking: thinking; advize: reflect.

8

salve: soothe; coloured: hidden. We note that the innocence of the lovers is now carefully and subtly qualified as they start to feel the need to disguise their actions. This would appear to contradict the understanding of courtesy as simple truth telling (i.3.8–9). 9

Fain’d: encouraged. assay: try.

10

Canto Three

41

When Calidore in seemly good array1 Unto his bowre was brought, and there undrest, Did sleepe all night through weary travell2 of his quest. 10 But faire Priscilla (so that Lady hight)3 Would to no bed, nor take no kindely4 sleepe, But by her wounded love did watch all night, And all the night for bitter anguish weepe, And with her teares his wounds did wash and steepe.5 So well she washt them, and so well she wacht him, That of the deadly swound,6 in which full deepe He drenched was, she at the length dispacht7 him, And drove away the stound, which mortally attacht8 him. 11 The morrow next, when day gan to uplooke, He also gan uplooke with drery eye, Like one that out of deadly dreame9 awooke: Where when he saw his faire Priscilla by, He deepely sigh’d, and groaned inwardly, To thinke of this ill state, in which she stood, To which she for his sake had weetingly10 Now brought her selfe, and blam’d11 her noble blood: For first, next after life, he tendered12 her good. 12 Which she perceiving, did with plenteous teares His care more then her owne compassionate,13 Forgetfull of her owne, to minde14 his feares: 1

array: demeanor. travell: work. The implication is that social duties may be as onerous as martial ones. 3 Priscilla: ancient; i.e., of established lineage. Her name continues the central theme of the book, the relationship between birth and virtue; hight: called. 4 kindely: natural. 5 steepe: stain. 6 swound: faint. 7 dispacht: woke up, relieved. 8 attacht: attacked, seized. 9 Dreams are of immense significance in the poem. The Redcrosse Knight has erotic 2

dreams in the early cantos of Book One, which reveal his mental state; Arthur is not sure whether he dreams up his encounter with Gloriana (I.ix), or whether it actually happened. 10 weetingly: deliberately, knowingly. 11 blam’d: an ambiguous term. Aladine might be recognizing that she has tended to him because of her noble blood, or that she has demeaned her natural status by attending him as a nurse. Again the poem asks us to consider what is natural and what is proper behavior. 12 tendered: cherished. 13 I.e., she cared more about his state than her own. 14 minde: think about.

42

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

So both conspiring, gan to intimate1 Each others griefe with zeale affectionate, And twixt them twaine with equall care to cast, How to save hole her hazarded estate;2 For which the onely helpe now left them last Seem’d to be Calidore: all other helpes were past. 13 Him they did deeme,3 as sure to them he seemed, A courteous Knight, and full of faithfull trust: Therefore to him their cause they best esteemed Whole to commit, and to his dealing just. Earely, so soone as Titans4 beames forth brust Through the thicke clouds, in which they steeped5 lay All night in darkenesse, duld with yron rust, Calidore rising up as fresh as day, Gan freshly him addresse unto his former way. 14 But first him seemed fit, that wounded Knight To visite, after this nights perillous passe,6 And to salute him, if he were in plight,7 And eke8 that Lady his faire lovely lasse. There he him found much better then he was, And moved speach to him of things of course,9 The anguish of his paine to overpasse:10 Mongst which he namely11 did to him discourse, Of former daies mishap, his sorrowes wicked sourse. 15 Of which occasion Aldine taking hold, Gan breake to him the fortunes of his love, And all his disadventures to unfold; 1

conspiring: feeling the same way; intimate: share. 2 hazarded estate: reputation, but also her property. In the early modern period, virtually all wealth was held in the form of property, so marriage was the key to preserving a family’s fortune. We might also note that Spenser’s estate in Ireland was sometimes known as “Hap Hazard.” 3 deeme: think.

4 Titans: this seems like an innocent reference to the sun, but we should note that the Titans were giants who rebelled against Jove, and that Mutabilitie is a Titanesse. 5 steeped: covered, hidden. 6 passe: passage. 7 plight: health. 8 eke: also. 9 things of course: everyday matters. 10 I.e., to distract him from his pain. 11 namely: particularly.

Canto Three

43

That Calidore it dearly deepe did move. In th’end his kyndly1 courtesie to prove, He him by all the bands of love besought, And as it mote a faithfull friend behove,2 To safeconduct his love, and not for ought To leave, till to her fathers house he had her brought. 16 Sir Calidore his faith thereto did plight,3 It to performe: so after little stay, That she her selfe had to the journey dight,4 He passed forth with her in faire array, Fearelesse, who ought did thinke, or ought did say, Sith his own thought he knew most cleare from wite.5 So as they past together on their way, He can devize this counter-cast of slight,6 To give faire colour to that Ladies cause in sight.7 17 Streight to the carkasse of that Knight he went, The cause of all this evill, who was slaine The day before by just avengement Of noble Tristram, where it did remaine: There he the necke thereof did cut in twaine, And tooke with him the head, the signe of shame. So forth he passed thorough that daies paine,8 Till to that Ladies fathers house he came, Most pensive9 man, through feare, what of his childe became. 18 There he arriving boldly, did present The fearefull Lady to her father deare, Most perfect pure, and guiltlesse innocent Of blame, as he did on his Knighthood sweare, Since first he saw her, and did free from feare Of a discourteous Knight, who her had reft,10

1

kyndly: natural. I.e., might seem necessary to a good friend. 3 plight: promise. 4 dight: prepared. 5 wite: blame. 6 slight: trick. 2

7

in sight: in public, for others. The opposition between good social practice and telling the truth is becoming more apparent as the book progresses. 8 paine: work. 9 pensive: anxious. 10 reft: taken.

44

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

And by outragious force away did beare: Witnesse thereof he shew’d his head there left, And wretched life forlorne for vengement of his theft.1 19 Most joyfull man her sire was her to see, And heare th’adventure of her late mischaunce; And thousand thankes to Calidore for fee Of his large paines in her deliveraunce Did yeeld; Ne lesse the Lady did advaunce. Thus having her restored trustily, As he had vow’d, some small continuaunce He there did make, and then most carefully Unto his first exploite he did him selfe apply. 20 So as he was pursuing of his quest He chaunst to come whereas a jolly Knight, In covert shade him selfe did safely rest, To solace with his Lady in delight: His warlike armes he had from him undight;2 For that him selfe he thought from daunger free, And far from envious eyes that mote him spight.3 And eke the Lady was full faire to see, And courteous withall, becomming her degree. 21 To whom Sir Calidore approaching nye, Ere they were well aware of living wight, Them much abasht,4 but more him selfe thereby, That he so rudely did uppon them light, And troubled had their quiet loves delight. Yet since it was his fortune, not his fault, Him selfe thereof he labour’d to acquite, And pardon crav’d for his so rash default, That he gainst courtesie so fowly did default.5 1

Calidore does not lie in presenting Priscilla’s story, but he is being economical with the truth by not mentioning that he found her with Aladine. There is also an uncomfortable juxtaposition in the Knight of Courtesy defending a lady’s honor while holding a severed head––a reminder of the violence shown everywhere in Book Six. 2 undight: removed.

3

The emphasis is placed on appearance and the need to disguise behavior that might be thought problematic, a further indication that courtesy is becoming more superficial as Calidore fails to pursue his quest effectively. 4 abasht: ashamed. 5 default: transgress. There is rich humor to be had in Calidore’s shamefaced apolo-

Canto Three

45

22 With which his gentle words and goodly wit He soone allayd that Knights conceiv’d displeasure, That he besought him downe by him to sit, That they mote treat of things abrode at leasure; And of adventures, which had in his measure Of so long waies to him befallen late. So downe he sate, and with delightfull pleasure His long adventures gan to him relate, Which he endured had through daungerous debate.1 23 Of which whilest they discoursed both together, The faire Serena (so his Lady hight)2 Allur’d with myldnesse of the gentle wether, And pleasaunce of the place, the which was dight3 With divers flowres distinct with rare delight; Wandred about the fields, as liking led Her wavering lust4 after her wandring sight, To make a garland to adorne her hed, Without suspect of ill or daungers hidden dred.5 24 All sodainely out of the forrest nere The Blatant Beast forth rushing unaware,6 Caught her thus loosely wandring7 here and there, And in his wide great mouth away her bare, Crying aloud in vaine, to shew her sad misfare8 Unto the Knights, and calling oft for ayde, Who with the horrour of her haplesse care9 Hastily starting up, like men dismayde, Ran after fast to reskue the distressed mayde. gies, but a serious point is also being made: he does not properly represent courtesy or understand what it really means. 1 debate: conflict. 2 Serena: meaning peaceful, but also suggesting complacent and wandering; hight: called. 3 dight: adorned, covered. 4 lust: desire, inclination. There is a suggestion of sexual desire. 5 In the first stanza in which she appears, Serena behaves exactly as her name sug-

gests, wandering carelessly and unaware of any danger. 6 Serena is unaware, not the Blatant Beast. 7 The use of “loosely” implies sexual laxness, which encourages the reader to reflect on the liaisons between knights and ladies in the first three cantos and on whether they are as morally neutral as the narrator has implied. Wandering is an action regularly associated with error in The Faerie Queene. 8 misfare: misfortune. 9 haplesse care: carelessness.

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25 The Beast with their pursuit incited more, Into the wood was bearing her apace For to have spoyled1 her, when Calidore Who was more light of foote and swift in chace, Him overtooke in middest of his race: And fiercely charging him with all his might, Forst to forgoe his pray there in the place, And to betake him selfe to fearefull flight; For he durst not abide with Calidore to fight. 26 Who nathelesse, when he the Lady saw There left on ground, though in full evill plight, Yet knowing that her Knight now neare did draw, Staide not to succour her in that affright, But follow’d fast the Monster in his flight: Through woods and hils he follow’d him so fast, That he nould let him breath nor gather spright,2 But forst him gape and gaspe, with dread aghast, As if his lungs and lites were nigh a sunder brast.3 27 And now by this Sir Calepine4 (so hight) Came to the place, where he his Lady found In dolorous5 dismay and deadly plight, All in gore bloud there tumbled on the ground, Having both sides through grypt6 with griesly wound. His weapons soone from him he threw away, And stouping downe to her in drery swound,7 Uprear’d her from the ground, whereon she lay, And in his tender armes her forced up to stay. 28 So well he did his busie paines apply, That the faint sprite he did revoke8 againe, To her fraile mansion of mortality. Then up he tooke her twixt his armes twaine, And setting on his steede, her did sustaine 1

spoyled: carried her off, with the implication of rape. 2 nould: would not; spright: breath. 3 lites: innards; brast: burst. 4 Calepine: the name has no specific meaning, but the use of “Cal” links him to Cali-

dore as the secondary Knight of Courtesy; “pine” links him to his enemy, Turpine. 5 dolorous: sorrowful. 6 grypt: pierced. 7 drery swound: dreadful faint. 8 revoke: bring back.

Canto Three

47

With carefull hands softing foot1 her beside, Till to some place of rest they mote attaine, Where she in safe assuraunce mote abide, Till she recured2 were of those her woundes wide. 29 Now when as Phoebus with his fiery waine3 Unto his Inne4 began to draw apace; Tho wexing5 weary of that toylesome paine, In travelling on foote so long a space, Not wont on foote with heavy armes to trace,6 Downe in a dale forby a rivers syde, He chaunst to spie a faire and stately place, To which he meant his weary steps to guyde, In hope there for his love some succour to provyde. 30 But comming to the rivers side, he found That hardly passable on foote it was: Therefore there still he stood as in a stound,7 Ne wist8 which way he through the foord mote pas. Thus whilest he was in this distressed case, Devising what to doe, he nigh espyde An armed Knight approaching to the place, With a faire Lady lincked by his syde, The which themselves prepard through the foord to ride. 31 Whom Calepine saluting (as became) Besought of courtesie in that his neede, For safe conducting of his sickely Dame, Through that same perillous foord with better heede,9 To take him up behinde upon his steed, To whom that other did this taunt returne. “Perdy thou peasant Knight, mightst rightly reed10 Me then to be full base and evill11 borne, If I would beare behinde a burden of such scorne. 1

softing foot: treading softly. recured: healed. 3 waine: wagon. 4 Inne: home. The sun is setting. 5 wexing: growing. 6 trace: travel. 7 stound: swoon. 2

8

wist: knew. heede: caution. 10 Perdy: perhaps; peasant: a term of abuse (again, directed at rank and status); reed: imagine, think. 11 evill: low. 9

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32 “But as thou hast thy steed forlorne1 with shame, So fare on foote till thou another gayne, And let thy Lady likewise doe the same, Or beare her on thy backe with pleasing payne, And prove thy manhood on the billowes vayne.”2 With which rude speach his Lady much displeased, Did him reprove, yet could him not restrayne, And would on her owne Palfrey him have eased, For pitty of his Dame, whom she saw so diseased.3 33 Sir Calepine her thanckt, yet inly wroth4 Against her Knight, her gentlenesse refused, And carelesly5 into the river goth, As in despight6 to be so fowle abused Of a rude churle, whom often he accused Of fowle discourtesie, unfit for Knight And strongly wading through the waves unused,7 With speare in th’one hand, stayd him selfe upright, With th’other staide his Lady up with steddy might. 34 And all the while, that same discourteous Knight, Stood on the further bancke beholding him,8 At whose calamity, for more despight He laught, and mockt to see him like to swim. But when as Calepine came to the brim,9 And saw his carriage10 past that perill well, Looking at that same Carle with count’nance grim, His heart with vengeaunce inwardly did swell, And forth at last did breake in speaches sharpe and fell.11

1

steed forlorne: horse lost. In romance, a knight losing a horse and having to walk on foot was a sign of shame. Calepine has lent his horse to Serena, which is an act of courtesy. The stanza indicates that old notions of chivalry and rank may need rethinking. 2 I.e., show your manhood by fighting the wind. 3 diseased: afflicted.

4

wroth: angry. carelesly: fearlessly. 6 despight: anger, fury. 7 unused: unfamiliar. 8 The narrative seems to jump a little here. 9 brim: edge. 10 carriage: burden. 11 fell: fierce. 5

Canto Three

35 “Unknightly Knight, the blemish of that name, And blot of all that armes uppon them take, Which is the badge of honour and of fame, Loe I defie thee, and here challenge make, That thou for ever doe those armes forsake; And be for ever held a recreant Knight, Unlesse thou dare for thy deare Ladies sake, And for thine owne defence on foote alight, To justifie thy fault gainst me in equall fight.” 36 The dastard,1 that did heare him selfe defyde, Seem’d not to weigh his threatfull words at all, But laught them out, as if his greater pryde, Did scorne the challenge of so base a thrall:2 Or had no courage, or else had no gall.3 So much the more was Calepine offended, That him to no revenge he forth could call, But both his challenge and him selfe contemned, Ne cared as a coward so to be condemned.4 37 But he nought weighing5 what he sayd or did, Turned his steede about another way, And with his Lady to the Castle rid, Where was his won;6 ne did the other stay, But after went directly as he may, For his sicke charge some harbour there to seeke; Where he arriving with the fall of day, Drew to the gate, and there with prayers meeke, And myld entreaty lodging did for her beseeke.7 38 But the rude Porter that no manners had, Did shut the gate against him in his face, And entraunce boldly unto him forbad. Nathelesse the Knight now in so needy case, Gan him entreat even with submission base, And humbly praid to let them in that night: 1

4

2

5

dastard: villain. thrall: slave, servant. 3 gall: spite, which was thought to flow from the gall bladder.

condemned: treated with contempt. weighing: caring. 6 won: house. 7 beseeke: beseech, ask.

49

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Who to him aunswer’d, that there was no place Of lodging fit for any errant1 Knight, Unlesse that with his Lord he formerly2 did fight. 39 “Full loth am I” (quoth he) “as now at earst,3 When day is spent, and rest us needeth most, And that this Lady, both whose sides are pearst With wounds, is ready to forgo the ghost: Ne would I gladly combate with mine host, That should to me such curtesie afford, Unlesse that I were thereunto enforst. But yet aread4 to me, how hight thy Lord, That doth thus strongly ward the Castle of the ford.” 40 “His name” (quoth he) “if that thou list to learne, Is hight Sir Turpine,5 one of mickle might, And manhood rare, but terrible and stearne6 In all assaies7 to every errant Knight, Because of one, that wrought him fowle despight.”8 “Ill seemes” (sayd he) “if he so valiaunt be, That he should be so sterne to stranger wight: For seldome yet did living creature see, That curtesie and manhood ever disagree. 41 “But go thy waies to him, and fro me say, That here is at his gate an errant Knight, That house-rome craves, yet would be loth t’assay The proofe of battell, now in doubtfull9 night, Or curtesie with rudenesse to requite: Yet if he needes will fight, crave leave till morne, And tell with all, the lamentable plight, In which this Lady languisheth forlorne,10 That pitty craves, as he of woman was yborne.” 1

errant: wandering. The knight errant was a traditional motif in romance. 2 formerly: first. 3 as now at earst: just now. 4 aread: tell. 5 Turpine: shameful. Turpine is a knight who shows no signs of courtesy, but is cowardly, selfish, and rude. 6 stearne: cruel.

7

assaies: fights. The suggestion is that one bad incident transformed Turpine into a cruel and malevolent knight, a sign of his own failings and lack of courtesy in his treatment of others. 9 doubtfull: awful, confusing. 10 forlorne: abandoned. 8

Canto Three

42 The groome went streight way in, and to his Lord Declar’d the message, which that Knight did move;1 Who sitting with his Lady then at bord,2 Not onely did not his demaund approve, But both himselfe revil’d, and eke his love; Albe his Lady, that Blandina3 hight, Him of ungentle usage did reprove And earnestly entreated that they might Finde favour to be lodged there for that same night. 43 Yet would he not perswaded be for ought, Ne from his currish will awhit reclame.4 Which answer when the groome returning, brought To Calepine, his heart did inly flame With wrathfull fury for so foule a shame, That he could not thereof avenged bee: But most for pitty of his dearest Dame, Whom now in deadly daunger he did see; Yet had no meanes to comfort, nor procure her glee.5 44 But all in vaine; for why,6 no remedy He saw, the present mischiefe to redresse, But th’utmost end perforce for to aby, Which that nights fortune would for him addresse.7 So downe he tooke his Lady in distresse, And layd her underneath a bush to sleepe, Cover’d with cold, and wrapt in wretchednesse, Whiles he him selfe all night did nought but weepe, And wary watch about her for her safegard keepe. 45 The morrow next, so soone as joyous day Did shew it selfe in sunny beames bedight,8 Serena full of dolorous dismay, Twixt darkenesse dread, and hope of living light, Uprear’d her head to see that chearefull sight. 1

4

2

5

move: make. bord: table. 3 Blandina: flatterer; the opposite extreme to Turpine, both abusers of courteous values. Blandina stands to Serena as Turpine does to Calepine.

reclame: draw back. glee: happiness. 6 for why: because. 7 addresse: prepare. 8 bedight: adorned.

51

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Then Calepine, how ever inly wroth, And greedy to avenge that vile despight, Yet for the feeble Ladies sake, full loth To make there lenger stay, forth on his journey goth. 46 He goth on foote all armed by her side, Upstaying1 still her selfe uppon her steede, Being unhable else alone to ride; So sore her sides, so much her wounds did bleede: Till that at length, in his extreamest neede, He chaunst far off an armed Knight to spy, Pursuing him apace with greedy speede, Whom well he wist2 to be some enemy, That meant to make advantage of his misery. 47 Wherefore he stayd, till that he nearer drew, To weet3 what issue would thereof betyde, Tho whenas he approched nigh in vew, By certaine signes he plainely him descryde,4 To be the man, that with such scornefull pryde Had him abusde, and shamed yesterday; Therefore misdoubting,5 least he should misguyde His former malice to some new assay,6 He cast to keepe him selfe so safely as he may. 48 By this the other came in place likewise, And couching close7 his speare and all his powre, As bent to some malicious enterprise, He bad him stand, t’abide the bitter stoure8 Of his sore vengeaunce, or to make avoure9 Of the lewd10 words and deedes, which he had done: With that ran at him, as he would devoure His life attonce; who nought could do, but shun The perill of his pride, or else be overrun. 1

Upstaying: supporting. wist: knew. 3 weet: know. 4 descryde: recognized. 5 misdoubting: fearing. 6 assay: attack, assault. 2

7 couching close: bending down, ready for battle. 8 stoure: assault. 9 make avoure: justify. 10 lewd: wicked––but, given his relationship with Serena, the word may have sexual overtones.

Canto Three

53

49 Yet he him still pursew’d from place to place, Will full intent him cruelly to kill, And like a wilde goate round about did chace, Flying the fury of his bloudy will. But his best succour1 and refuge was still Behinde his Ladies backe, who to him cryde, And called oft with prayers loud and shrill, As ever he to Lady was affyde,2 To spare her Knight, and rest with reason pacifyde. 50 But he the more thereby enraged was, And with more eager felnesse3 him pursew’d, So that at length, after long weary chace, Having by chaunce a close advantage vew’d, He over raught him, having long eschew’d4 His violence in vaine, and with his spere Strooke through his shoulder, that the blood ensew’d In great aboundance, as a well it were, That forth out of an hill fresh gushing did appere. 51 Yet ceast he not for all that cruell wound, But chaste him still, for all his Ladies cry, Not satisfyde till on the fatall ground He saw his life powrd forth dispiteously: The which was certes in great jeopardy, Had not a wondrous chaunce his reskue wrought, And saved from his cruell villany. Such chaunces oft exceed all humaine thought: That in another Canto shall to end be brought.

1 2

succour: help. affyde: betrothed.

3 4

felnesse: cruelty, fierceness. over raught: overtook; eschew’d: avoided.

Canto Four Calepine by a salvage man from Turpine reskewed is, And whylest an Infant from a Beare he saves, his love doth misse.

1

Like as a ship with dreadfull storme long tost,

Having spent all her mastes and her ground-hold,1 Now farre from harbour likely to be lost, At last some fisher barke2 doth neare behold, That giveth comfort to her courage cold. Such was the state of this most courteous knight Being oppressed by that faytour3 bold, That he remayned in most perilous plight, And his sad Ladie left in pitifull affright. 2

Till that by fortune, passing all foresight, A salvage man, which in those woods did wonne,4 Drawne with that Ladies loud and piteous shright,5 Toward the same incessantly6 did ronne, To understand what there was to be donne. There he this most discourteous craven found, As fiercely yet, as when he first begonne, Chasing the gentle Calepine around, Ne sparing him the more for all his grievous wound.

3

The salvage man, that never till this houre Did taste of pittie, neither gentlesse knew, Seeing his sharpe assault and cruell stoure7

for further discussion). There is a further pun on savage/salvage, indicating that he can be saved or civilized; wonne: dwell. 5 shright: cry, shriek. 6 incessantly: immediately. 7 stoure: peril.

1

spent: lost; ground-hold: anchor. barke: a small fishing boat. 3 faytour: villain. 4 salvage man: a wild man of the woods ––a common figure in romance, but also a savage man who may be a cannibal from the New World (see Introduction, “Savagery,” 2

54

Canto Four

55

Was much emmoved at his perils vew, That even his ruder hart began to rew,1 And feele compassion of his evill plight, Against his foe that did him so pursew: From whom he meant to free him, if he might, And him avenge of that so villenous despight.2 4

Yet armes or weapon had he none to fight, Ne knew the use of warlike instruments, Save such as sudden rage him lent to smite, But naked without needfull vestiments, To clad his corpse with meete habiliments,3 He cared not for dint4 of sword nor speere, No more then for the stroke of strawes or bents:5 For from his mothers wombe, which him did beare He was invulnerable made by Magicke leare.6

5

He stayed not t’advize,7 which way were best His foe t’assayle, or how himselfe to gard,8 But with fierce fury and with force infest9 Upon him ran; who being well prepard, His first assault full warily did ward, And with the push of his sharp-pointed speare Full on the breast him strooke, so strong and hard, That forst him backe recoyle, and reele areare;10 Yet in his bodie made no wound nor bloud appeare.

6

With that the wyld man more enraged grew, Like to a Tygre that hath mist his pray, And with mad mood againe upon him flew, Regarding neither speare, that mote him slay, Nor his fierce steed, that mote him much dismay. The salvage nation doth all dread despize:

1

rew: pity. The Salvage Man experiences pity naturally and has not learned any of his responses. 3 meete: proper; habiliments: clothes, equipment. 4 dint: blow. 5 bents: reeds, rushes. 2

6

leare: lore. Perhaps such magic undermines the Salvage Man’s status as a natural man. 7 advize: consider, think. 8 gard: protect. 9 infest: hostile. 10 areare: backward.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Tho on his shield he griple1 hold did lay, And held the same so hard, that by no wize He could him force to loose, or leave his enterprize. 7

Long did he wrest and wring it to and fro, And every way did try, but all in vaine: For he would not his greedie grype forgoe, But hayld2 and puld with all his might and maine, That from his steed him nigh he drew againe. Who having now no use of his long speare, So nigh at hand, nor force his shield to straine,3 Both speare and shield, as things that needlesse were, He quite forsooke, and fled himselfe away for feare.

8

But after him the wyld man ran apace,4 And him pursewed with importune5 speed, (For he was swift as any Bucke in chace) And had he not in his extreamest need, Bene helped through the swiftnesse of his steed, He had him overtaken in his flight. Who ever, as he saw him nigh succeed,6 Gan cry aloud with horrible affright, And shrieked out, a thing uncomely for a knight.7

9

But when the Salvage saw his labour vaine, In following of him, that fled so fast, He wearie woxe,8 and backe return’d againe With speede unto the place, whereas he last Had left that couple, nere their utmost cast.9 There he that knight full sorely bleeding found, And eke the Ladie fearefully aghast,10 Both for the perill of the present stound,11 And also for the sharpnesse of her rankling12 wound.

1

Tho: then; griple: strong, gripping. hayld: tugged. 3 straine: grasp. 4 apace: swiftly. 5 importune: impressive. 6 succeed: approach. 7 Another humorous line, Turpine failing 2

spectacularly to live up to the ideals of knighthood. 8 woxe: grew. 9 I.e., nearly dead. 10 aghast: terrified. 11 stound: situation. 12 rankling: tormenting.

Canto Four

57

10 For though she were right glad, so rid to bee From that vile lozell,1 which her late offended, Yet now no lesse encombrance2 she did see, And perill by this salvage man pretended;3 Gainst whom she saw no meanes to be defended, By reason that her knight was wounded sore. Therefore her selfe she wholy recommended To Gods sole grace, whom she did oft implore, To send her succour, being of all hope forlore.4 11 But the wyld man, contrarie to her feare, Came to her creeping like a fawning hound, And by rude5 tokens made to her appeare His deepe compassion of her dolefull stound,6 Kissing his hands, and crouching to the ground; For other language had he none nor speach, But a soft murmure, and confused sound Of senselesse words, which nature did him teach, T’expresse his passions, which his reason did empeach.7 12 And comming likewise to the wounded knight, When he beheld the streames of purple blood Yet flowing fresh, as moved with the sight, He made great mone8 after his salvage mood, And running streight into the thickest wood, A certaine herbe from thence unto him brought, Whose vertue he by use well understood: The juyce whereof into his wound he wrought, And stopt the bleeding straight, ere he it staunched thought. 13 Then taking up that Recreants shield and speare, Which earst he left, he signes unto them made, With him to wend unto his wonning9 neare: To which he easily did them perswade

1

lozell: villain. encombrance: trouble. 3 pretended: threatened. 4 forlore: abandoned. 5 A pointed contrast to the use of “rude” earlier in the book. Here, rude means 2

simple and therefore natural, generous, and courteous––not the opposite of courtesy. 6 stound: wound, hurt. 7 empeach: prevent. 8 mone: groan, lament. 9 wend: come; wonning: dwelling, house.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Farre in the forrest by a hollow glade, Covered with mossie shrubs, which spredding brode Did underneath them make a gloomy shade; There foot of living creature never trode, Ne scarse wyld beasts durst come, there was this wights abode. 14 Thether he brought these unacquainted1 guests; To whom faire semblance,2 as he could, he shewed By signes, by lookes, and all his other gests.3 But the bare ground, with hoarie4 mosse bestrowed, Must be their bed, their pillow was unsowed,5 And the frutes of the forrest was their feast: For their bad Stuard neither plough’d nor sowed, Ne fed on flesh, ne ever of wyld beast Did taste the bloud, obaying natures first beheast.6 15 Yet howsoever base and meane it were, They tooke it well, and thanked God for all, Which had them freed from that deadly feare, And sav’d from being to that caytive7 thrall. Here they of force (as fortune now did fall) Compelled were themselves a while to rest, Glad of that easement,8 though it were but small; That having there their wounds awhile redrest, They mote the abler be to passe unto the rest. 16 During which time, that wyld man did apply His best endevour, and his daily paine,9 In seeking all the woods both farre and nye For herbes to dresse their wounds; still seeming faine,10

1

unacquainted: unknown. A sign of his trusting nature. 2 semblance: appearance. 3 gests: gestures. The Salvage Man is unable to speak, but communicates his good will as best he can. This suggests that his current state, living in a gloomy and remote place, is temporary and that he will join the ranks of the civilized eventually. 4 hoarie: frosty. 5 unsowed: natural, uncultivated.

6

See Gen. 9.4, “But flesh with the life thereof, I meane, with the blood thereof, shall ye not eate.” The Salvage Man appears to represent uncorrupted, good nature–– although the signs are not without some ambiguity. 7 caytive: villain. 8 easement: relief. 9 paine: labor. 10 faine: happy.

Canto Four

59

When ought he did, that did their lyking gaine. So as ere long he had that knightes wound Recured well, and made him whole againe: But that same Ladies hurts no herbe he found, Which could redresse, for it was inwardly unsound. 17 Now when as Calepine was woxen strong, Upon a day he cast abrode to wend,1 To take the ayre, and heare the thrushes song, Unarm’d, as fearing neither foe nor frend, And without sword his person to defend.2 There him befell, unlooked for before, An hard adventure with unhappie end, A cruell Beare, the which an infant bore Betwixt his bloodie jawes, besprinckled all with gore. 18 The litle babe did loudly scrike3 and squall, And all the woods with piteous plaints4 did fill, As if his cry did meane for helpe to call5 To Calepine, whose eares those shrieches shrill Percing his hart with pities point did thrill; That after him, he ran with zealous haste, To rescue th’infant, ere he did him kill: Whom though he saw now somewhat overpast,6 Yet by the cry he follow’d, and pursewed fast. 19 Well then him chaunst his heavy armes to want,7 Whose burden mote empeach8 his needfull speed, And hinder him from libertie to pant:9 For having long time, as his daily weed,10

1

cast: decided; wend: go, wander. The verse warns the reader that an unarmed knight is asking for trouble, especially given the dangers that threaten the unprotected rural society in Book Six. 3 scrike: shriek. 4 plaints: cries, laments. 5 This statement links the cries of the baby who cannot speak to the inarticulate attempts to communicate of the Salvage Man. 2

6

overpast: i.e., speeding off into the distance and so hard to catch. 7 I.e., it was lucky that he did not have his heavy armor with him. Calepine, like the Salvage Man, is now unarmed. It brings good luck now, but the implication is that this may not always be the case. 8 empeach: impede. 9 pant: i.e., run fast until he pants. 10 weed: clothing.

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Them wont to weare, and wend1 on foot for need, Now wanting them he felt himselfe so light, That like an Hauke, which feeling her selfe freed From bels and jesses,2 which did let her flight, Him seem’d his feet did fly, and in their speed delight.3 20 So well he sped him, that the wearie Beare Ere long he overtooke, and forst to stay, And without weapon him assayling neare, Compeld him soone the spoyle adowne to lay. Wherewith the beast enrag’d to loose his pray, Upon him turned, and with greedie force And furie, to be crossed in his way, Gaping full wyde, did thinke without remorse4 To be aveng’d on him, and to devoure his corse.5 21 But the bold knight no whit thereat dismayd, But catching up in hand a ragged6 stone, Which lay thereby (so fortune him did ayde) Upon him ran, and thrust it all attone Into his gaping throte, that made him grone And gaspe for breath, that he nigh choked was, Being unable to digest that bone; Ne could it upward come, nor downward passe, Ne could he brooke7 the coldnesse of the stony masse. 22 Whom when as he thus combred8 did behold, Stryving in vaine that nigh his bowels brast, He with him closd, and laying mightie hold Upon his throte, did gripe his gorge9 so fast, That wanting breath, him downe to ground he cast; And then oppressing him with urgent10 paine,

1

wend: travel. bels and jesses: the harnesses used to restrain a hawk. 3 The suggestion of this comparison may be that, when liberated of the constraints of civilization, humans experience freedom (which may be good or bad). 4 without remorse: without reflection. 2

We are immediately reminded that nature can be savage and frightening. 5 corse: body. 6 ragged: jagged. 7 brooke: stand, tolerate. 8 combred: hindered. 9 gorge: windpipe. 10 oppressing: pressing; urgent: severe.

Canto Four

61

Ere long enforst to breath his utmost blast, Gnashing his cruell teeth at him in vaine, And threatning his sharpe clawes, now wanting powre to straine.1 23 Then tooke he up betwixt his armes twaine The litle babe, sweet relickes of his pray; Whom pitying to heare so sore complaine, From his soft eyes the teares he wypt away, And from his face the filth that did it ray,2 And every litle limbe he searcht around, And every part, that under sweathbands3 lay, Least that the beasts sharpe teeth had any wound Made in his tender flesh, but whole them all he found. 24 So having all his bands againe uptyde, He with him thought backe to returne againe: But when he lookt about on every syde, To weet which way were best to entertaine,4 To bring him to the place, where he would faine,5 He could no path nor tract of foot descry,6 Ne by inquirie learne, nor ghesse by ayme. For nought but woods and forrests farre and nye, That all about did close the compasse of his eye. 25 Much was he then encombred,7 ne could tell Which way to take: now West he went a while, Then North; then neither, but as fortune fell. So up and downe he wandred many a mile, With wearie travell and uncertaine8 toile, Yet nought the nearer to his journeys end; And evermore his lovely litle spoile9 Crying for food, did greatly him offend. So all that day in wandring vainely he did spend.10 1

straine: seize. ray: soil, defile. 3 sweathbands: swaddling clothes. 4 weet: know; entertaine: take. 5 faine: wish, desire. 6 descry: discover. 7 encombred: disturbed, worried. 8 uncertaine: pointless. 2

9

spoile: treasure, child, perhaps hinting at brat. 10 A description that links him to Serena, who also wanders without purpose––a sign of the lack of direction in the book, which is full of characters who have no idea where they are going because they have not been given proper guidance.

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26 At last about the setting of the Sunne, Him selfe out of the forest he did wynd,1 And by good fortune the plaine champion wonne:2 Where looking all about, where he mote fynd Some place of succour to content his mynd, At length he heard under the forrests syde A voice, that seemed of some woman kynd, Which to her selfe lamenting loudly cryde, And oft complayn’d of fate, and fortune oft defyde. 27 To whom approching, when as she perceived A stranger wight in place, her plaint she stayd, As if she doubted3 to have bene deceived, Or loth to let her sorrowes be bewrayd.4 Whom when as Calepine saw so dismayd, He to her drew, and with faire blandishment5 Her chearing up, thus gently6 to her sayd; “What be you wofull Dame, which thus lament, And for what cause declare, so mote ye not repent.” 28 To whom she thus, “what need me Sir to tell, That which your selfe have earst ared7 so right? A wofull dame ye have me termed well; So much more wofull, as my wofull plight Cannot redressed be by living wight.” “Nathlesse” (quoth he) “if need doe not you bynd, Doe it disclose, to ease your grieved spright: Oftimes it haps, that sorrowes of the mynd Find remedie unsought, which seeking cannot fynd.”8 29 Then thus began the lamentable9 Dame; “Sith then ye needs will know the griefe I hoord, I am th’unfortunate Matilde by name,

1

6

2

7

wynd: come by chance. plaine champion: open country; wonne: reach. 3 doubted: worried. 4 bewrayd: revealed. 5 blandishment: encouragement, often used to mean flattery.

gently: also meaning courteously. earst: just; ared: learned. 8 Continuing the theme of chance in the book. All too often, characters find that luck and chance, not planning and strategy, determine the outcome of events, a sign of the chaos that is engulfing Faerie Land. 9 lamentable: mournful.

Canto Four

63

The wife of bold Sir Bruin,1 who is Lord Of all this land, late conquer’d by his sword From a great Gyant, called Cormoraunt;2 Whom he did overthrow by yonder foord, And in three battailes did so deadly daunt,3 That he dare not returne for all his daily vaunt.4 30 “So is my Lord now seiz’d5 of all the land, As in his fee,6 with peaceable estate, And quietly doth hold it in his hand, Ne any dares with him for it debate.7 But to these happie fortunes, cruell fate Hath joyn’d one evill, which doth overthrow All these our joyes, and all our blisse abate;8 And like in time to further ill to grow, And all this land with endlesse losse to overflow. 31 “For th’heavens envying our prosperitie, Have not vouchsaft9 to graunt unto us twaine The gladfull blessing of posteritie, Which we might see after our selves remaine In th’heritage of our unhappie paine:10 So that for want of heires it to defend, All is in time like to returne againe To that foule feend, who dayly doth attend11 To leape into the same after our lives end.

1

7

2

8

Bruin: brown bear. Cormoraunt: crow; suggests rapacious greed. 3 daunt: defeat. 4 vaunt: boasting, pride. The story suggests that might is right in this world. 5

seiz’d: in control of. fee: rightful possession. The story may be linked to the story of Jove’s possession of the universe, which he ruled by right of conquest after he overthrew his father, Saturn. The story is an important motif in the poem and appears again in the Two Cantos of Mutabilitie. 6

debate: challenge. abate: diminish. 9 vouchsaft: promised. 10 I.e., in the possession of our hard labor, which, as a result, becomes unhappy. Matilda’s childlessness indicates the vicissitudes of power in a society that based wealth on the possession of land, especially for monarchs. Matilda (1102–1167), the daughter of Henry I, was a troubled queen of England who had to fight a series of civil wars and left behind no stable heir. 11 attend: wait.

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32 “But most my Lord is grieved herewithall, And makes exceeding mone,1 when he does thinke That all this land unto his foe shall fall, For which he long in vaine did sweat and swinke,2 That now the same he greatly doth forthinke.3 Yet was it sayd, there should to him a sonne Be gotten, not begotten, which should drinke And dry up all the water, which doth ronne In the next brooke, by whom that feend shold be fordonne.4 33 “Well hop’t he then, when this was propheside, That from his sides5 some noble chyld should rize, The which through fame should farre be magnifide, And this proud gyant should with brave emprize6 Quite overthrow, who now ginnes to despize The good Sir Bruin, growing farre in yeares; Who thinkes from me his sorrow all doth rize.7 Lo this my cause of griefe to you appeares; For which I thus doe mourne, and poure forth ceaselesse teares.” 34 Which when he heard, he inly touched was With tender ruth8 for her unworthy griefe, And when he had devized of 9 her case, He gan in mind conceive a fit reliefe For all her paine, if please her make the priefe.10 And having cheared her, thus said; “faire Dame, In evils counsell is the comfort chiefe, Which though I be not wise enough to frame, Yet as I well it meane, vouchsafe11 it without blame.

1

mone: complaint. swinke: labor. 3 forthinke: regret. 4 fordonne: killed. Prophecies were often mysterious, as they invariably contained dangerous information––especially about the fate of monarchs who might be acted upon by interested parties. As in this prophecy, they often looked forward to an apocalyptic moment that suggested great import and danger, but was also a vague moment in the far future. 2

5

sides: loins. emprize: enterprise. 7 This had happened in recent English history, when Henry VIII had his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled because they produced no male heir. 8 ruth: pity. 9 devized of: considered. 10 priefe: proof. 11 vouchsafe: accept. A courteous and rather circumlocutory introduction to Calidore’s thoughts. 6

Canto Four

65

35 “If that the cause of this your languishment1 Be lacke of children, to supply your place, Lo how good fortune doth to you present This litle babe, of sweete and lovely face, And spotlesse spirit, in which ye may enchace2 What ever formes ye list thereto apply, Being now soft and fit them to embrace; Whether ye list him traine in chevalry, Or noursle up3 in lore of learn’d Philosophy. 36 “And certes it hath oftentimes bene seene, That of the like, whose linage was unknowne, More brave and noble knights have raysed beene, As their victorious deedes have often showen, Being with fame through many Nations blowen, Then those, which have bene dandled in the lap. Therefore some thought, that those brave imps4 were sowen Here by the Gods, and fed with heavenly sap, That made them grow so high t’all honorable hap.”5 37 The Ladie hearkning to his sensefull speach, Found nothing that he said, unmeet nor geason,6 Having oft seene it tryde,7 as he did teach. Therefore inclyning to his goodly reason, Agreeing well both with the place and season, She gladly did of that same babe accept, As of her owne by liverey and seisin,8 And having over it a litle wept, She bore it thence, and ever as her owne it kept. 38 Right glad was Calepine to be so rid Of his young charge, whereof he skilled nought:9 Ne she lesse glad; for she so wisely did, 1

languishment: sorrow. enchace: mould. 3 noursle up: educate. Calidore advises that nurture will solve everything and that Sir Bruin and Matilda will be able to make a child be whatever they wish. 4 imps: children. 5 Referring to the literary phenomenon of the changeling, of which there are many examples in the poem. 2

6

geason: odd, strange. tryde: proved. 8 liverey and seisin: delivery and possession (a legal term). 9 skilled nought: was unskilled; i.e., he has no idea how to raise children (even though he is happy enough to give advice on how to do so). Spenser is again being rather humorous at the expense of the Knights of Courtesy. 7

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And with her husband under hand so wrought, That when that infant unto him she brought, She made him thinke it surely was his owne,1 And it in goodly thewes2 so well upbrought, That it became a famous knight well knowne And did right noble deedes, the which elswhere are showne. 39 But Calepine, now being left alone Under the greenewoods side3 in sorie plight, Withouten armes or steede to ride upon, Or house to hide his head from heavens spight,4 Albe5 that Dame by all the meanes she might, Him oft desired home with her to wend,6 And offred him, his courtesie to requite, Both horse and armes, and what so else to lend, Yet he them all refusd, though thankt her as a frend. 40 And for exceeding griefe which inly grew, That he his love so lucklesse now had lost, On the cold ground, maugre7 himselfe he threw, For fell despight,8 to be so sorely crost; And there all night himselfe in anguish tost, Vowing, that never he in bed againe His limbes would rest, ne lig in ease embost,9 Till that his Ladies sight he mote attaine, Or understand, that she in safetie did remaine.

1 Ambiguous sense: does she actually make him think the infant is his own, or do they treat the baby as one of their own? Again, we witness courtesy close to lying. 2 thewes: manners. 3 side: borders. 4 spight: malice.

5

Albe: although. wend: travel. 7 maugre: in spite of, meaning against his interests. 8 despight: anger. 9 ne lig: nor lie; embost: wrapped, cocooned. 6

Canto Five The salvage serves Matilda well till she Prince Arthure fynd, Who her together with his Squyre with th’Hermit leaves behynd.

1

O what an easie thing is to descry1 The gentle bloud, how ever it be wrapt In sad misfortunes foule deformity, And wretched sorrowes, which have often hapt? For howsoever it may grow mis-shapt, Like this wyld man, being undisciplynd,2 That to all vertue it may seeme unapt,3 Yet will it shew some sparkes of gentle mynd, And at the last breake forth in his owne proper kynd.

2

That plainely may in this wyld man be red,4 Who though he were still in this desert wood, Mongst salvage beasts, both rudely borne and bred, Ne ever saw faire guize,5 ne learned good, Yet shewd some token of his gentle blood, By gentle usage of that wretched Dame. For certes he was borne of noble blood, How ever by hard hap he hether came; As ye may know, when time shall be to tell the same.6

3

Who when as now long time he lacked7 had The good Sir Calepine, that farre was strayd, Did wexe exceeding sorrowfull and sad,

1

5

descry: perceive, discover. undisciplynd: uneducated. See the “The Letter to Raleigh,” which describes the purpose of the poem as to “fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline.” 3 unapt: inappropriate. 4 red: seen.

guize: behavior. A story that Spenser never tells, whether deliberately or not. This statement by the narrator is part of an ongoing debate in the poem and does not have to be taken at face value: see Introduction, “Savagery.” 7 lacked: missed.

2

6

67

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

As he of some misfortune were afrayd: And leaving there this Ladie all dismayd, Went forth streightway into the forrest wyde, To seeke, if he perchance a sleepe were layd, Or what so else were unto him betyde: He sought him farre and neare, yet him no where he spyde. 4

Tho1 backe returning to that sorie Dame, He shewed semblant of exceeding mone,2 By speaking signes, as he them best could frame; Now wringing both his wretched hands in one, Now beating his hard head upon a stone, That ruth it was to see him so lament. By which she well perceiving, what was done, Gan teare her hayre, and all her garments rent, And beat her breast, and piteously her selfe torment.

5

Upon the ground her selfe she fiercely threw, Regardlesse of her wounds, yet bleeding rife, That with their bloud did all the flore imbrew,3 As if her breast new launcht4 with murdrous knife, Would streight dislodge the wretched wearie life. There she long groveling, and deepe groning lay, As if her vitall powers were at strife With stronger death, and feared their decay, Such were this Ladies pangs and dolorous assay.5

6

Whom when the Salvage saw so sore distrest, He reared her up from the bloudie ground, And sought by all the meanes, that he could6 best Her to recure7 out of that stony swound, And staunch the bleeding of her dreary8 wound. Yet nould she be recomforted for nought, Ne cease her sorrow and impatient stound,9 But day and night did vexe her carefull thought, And ever more and more her owne affliction wrought.

1

6

2

7

Tho: then. semblant: signs; mone: grief. 3 flore: ground; imbrew: stain. 4 launcht: pierced. 5 assay: affliction.

could: knew. recure: restore. 8 dreary: bloody. 9 impatient stound: unendurable wound, with the sense of getting worse rapidly.

Canto Five

7

At length, when as no hope of his retourne She saw now left, she cast1 to leave the place, And wend2 abrode, though feeble and forlorne, To seeke some comfort in that sorie case. His steede now strong through rest so long a space, Well as she could, she got, and did bedight,3 And being thereon mounted, forth did pace, Withouten guide,4 her to conduct aright, Or gard her to defend from bold oppressors might.

8

Whom when her Host5 saw readie to depart, He would not suffer her alone to fare, But gan himselfe addresse6 to take her part. Those warlike armes, which Calepine whyleare7 Had left behind, he gan eftsoones prepare, And put them all about himselfe unfit,8 His shield, his helmet, and his curats bare.9 But without sword upon his thigh to sit: Sir Calepine himselfe away had hidden it.

9

So forth they traveld an uneven payre,10 That mote to all men seeme an uncouth11 sight; A salvage man matcht with a Ladie fayre, That rather seem’d the conquest of his might, Gotten by spoyle, then purchaced aright. But he did her attend most carefully, And faithfully did serve both day and night, Withouten thought of shame or villeny, Ne ever shewed signe of foule disloyalty.

69

10 Upon a day as on their way they went, It chaunst some furniture12 about her steed To be disordred by some accident:

1

6

2

7

cast: decided. wend: go. 3 bedight: equip, harness. 4 See i.6.2. The sense seems to suggest benign providence, but the reader is warned that things may not turn out as they seem. 5 I.e., the Salvage Man.

addresse: get ready. whyleare: earlier. 8 unfit: ill-fitting. 9 curats: cuirasses, leg armor; bare: wore. 10 uneven payre: odd couple. 11 uncouth: strange, unusual. 12 furniture: equipment.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Which to redresse, she did th’assistance need Of this her groome, which he by signes did reede,1 And streight his combrous2 armes aside did lay Upon the ground, withouten doubt3 or dreed, And in his homely wize began to assay T’amend what was amisse, and put in right aray. 11 Bout which whilest he was busied thus hard, Lo where a knight together with his squire, All arm’d to point4 came ryding thetherward, Which seemed by their portance5 and attire, To be two errant knights, that did inquire6 After adventures, where they mote them get. Those were to weet (if that ye it require)7 Prince Arthur and young Timias,8 which met By straunge occasion, that here needs forth be set. 12 After that Timias had againe recured9 The favour of Belphebe, (as ye heard)10 And of her grace did stand againe assured, To happie blisse he was full high uprear’d, Nether of envy, nor of chaunge afeard, Though many foes did him maligne therefore, And with unjust detraction him did beard;11 Yet he himselfe so well and wisely bore, That in her soveraine lyking he dwelt evermore.

1

reede: understand. combrous: cumbersome. 3 doubt: fear. The narrator stresses the lack of fear that the Salvage Man experiences, because he is invulnerable and because he is innocent of the cares of the world. 4 to point: from head to toe. 5 portance: bearing. 6 inquire: seek. 7 require: ask. 8 Timias: Arthur’s squire, who first appears at I.viii.37 and plays an important role in 2

Books Three and Four, falling in love with the Amazon, Belphoebe. She rejects his passion, but then accepts his good and faithful service after he proves himself. The episode clearly alludes to the fate of Spenser’s friend, Sir Walter Raleigh, who was disgraced after he secretly married Elizabeth Throckmorton, one of Elizabeth’s ladies-in-waiting. 9 recured: recovered. 10 IV.ii.17–18. 11 beard: insult.

Canto Five

71

13 But of them all, which did his ruine seeke Three mightie enemies did him most despight, Three mightie ones, and cruell minded eeke,1 That him not onely sought by open might To overthrow, but to supplant by slight.2 The first of them by name was cald Despetto, Exceeding all the rest in powre and hight; The second not so strong but wise, Decetto; The third nor strong nor wise, but spightfullest Defetto.3 14 Oftimes their sundry powres they did employ, And severall4 deceipts, but all in vaine: For neither they by force could him destroy, Ne yet entrap in treasons subtill traine.5 Therefore conspiring all together plaine, They did their counsels now in one compound; Where singled forces faile, conjoynd may gaine. The Blatant Beast the fittest meanes they found, To worke his utter shame, and throughly him confound.6 15 Upon a day as they the time did waite, When he did raunge the wood for salvage game, They sent that Blatant Beast to be a baite, To draw him from his deare beloved dame, Unwares into the daunger of defame.7 For well they wist, that Squire to be so bold, That no one beast in forrest wylde or tame, Met him in chase, but he it challenge would, And plucke the pray oftimes out of their greedy hould. 16 The hardy boy, as they devised8 had, Seeing the ugly Monster passing by, Upon him set, of perill nought adrad,9 1

eeke: also. slight: deceit. 3 Despetto, Decetto, Defetto: spite, deceit, and detraction. These three villains can be linked to the unholy trinity of the pagan knights, Sansfoy, Sansjoy, and Sansloy, who attack the Redcrosse Knight at I.ii through iv. The vices of Despetto, Decetto, and Defetto join together and encourage the 2

Blatant Beast to attack Calidore, one of many composite allegorical unions in the poem. 4 severall: various. 5

traine: snare. confound: destroy. 7 defame: defamation, disgrace. 8 devised: planned. 9 perill nought adrad: not afraid of danger. 6

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Ne skilfull of the uncouth jeopardy;1 And charged him so fierce and furiously, That his great force unable to endure, He forced was to turne from him and fly: Yet ere he fled, he with his tooth impure Him heedlesse bit, the whiles he was thereof secure.2 17 Securely3 he did after him pursew, Thinking by speed to overtake his flight; Who through thicke woods and brakes4 and briers him drew, To weary him the more, and waste his spight,5 So that he now has almost spent his spright.6 Till that at length unto a woody glade He came, whose covert stopt his further sight, There his three foes shrowded in guilefull shade, Out of their ambush broke, and gan him to invade.7 18 Sharpely they all attonce did him assaile, Burning with inward rancour and despight, And heaped strokes did round about him haile8 With so huge force, that seemed nothing might Beare off their blowes, from percing thorough quite. Yet he them all so warily did ward,9 That none of them in his soft flesh did bite, And all the while his backe for best safegard, He lent against a tree, that backeward onset bard. 19 Like a wylde Bull, that being at a bay, Is bayted of a mastiffe, and a hound, And a curre-dog; that doe him sharpe assay10 On every side, and beat about him round; But most that curre barking with bitter sownd, And creeping still behinde, doth him incomber,11

1

6

2

7

I.e., not caring about the unknown danger. secure: complacent, unaware of danger. 3 Securely: confidently (implying too confidently). 4 brakes: bracken. 5 spight: power.

spright: spirit, breath. invade: attack. 8 haile: rain. 9 ward: repel. 10 assay: attack. 11 incomber: torment.

Canto Five

73

That in his chauffe1 he digs the trampled ground, And threats his horns, and bellowes like the thonder, So did that Squire his foes disperse, and drive asonder.2 20 Him well behoved so;3 for his three foes Sought to encompasse him on every side, And dangerously did round about enclose. But most of all Defetto him annoyde, Creeping behinde him still to have destroyde: So did Decetto eke him circumvent, But stout Despetto in his greater pryde, Did front him face to face against him bent, Yet he them all withstood, and often made relent. 21 Till that at length nigh tyrd with former chace, And weary now with carefull keeping ward, He gan to shrinke, and somewhat to give place, Full like ere long to have escaped hard;4 When as unwares he in the forrest heard A trampling steede, that with his neighing fast Did warne his rider be uppon his gard; With noise whereof the Squire now nigh aghast, Revived was, and sad dispaire away did cast. 22 Eftsoones he spide a Knight approching nye, Who seeing one in so great daunger set Mongst many foes, him selfe did faster hye; To reskue him, and his weake part abet,5 For pitty so to see him overset.6 Whom soone as his three enemies did vew, They fled, and fast into the wood did get: Him booted not7 to thinke them to pursew, The covert was so thicke, that did no passage shew.

1

chauffe: rage. The extended animal image shows what lies beneath the surface of courtesy. 3 Him well behoved so: he defended himself well. 2

4

hard: with difficulty. abet: help. 6 overset: set upon, overrun. 7 Him booted not: it was no advantage to him. 5

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23 Then turning to that swaine, him1 well he knew To be his Timias, his owne true Squire, Whereof exceeding glad, he to him drew, And him embracing twixt his armes entire, Him thus bespake; “My liefe, my lifes desire, Why have ye me alone thus long yleft? Tell me what worlds despight, or heavens yre Hath you thus long away from me bereft? Where have ye all this while bin wandring, where bene weft?”2 24 With that he sighed deepe for inward tyne:3 To whom the Squire nought aunswered againe, But shedding few soft teares from tender eyne, His deare affect4 with silence did restraine, And shut up all his plaint in privy paine. There they awhile some gracious speaches spent,5 As to them seemed fit time to entertaine. After all which up to their steedes they went, And forth together rode a comely couplement.6 25 So now they be arrived both in sight Of this wyld man, whom they full busie found About the sad Serena things to dight,7 With those brave armours lying on the ground, That seem’d the spoile of some right well renownd. Which when that Squire beheld, he to them stept, Thinking to take them from that hylding hound:8 But he it seeing, lightly to him lept, And sternely with strong hand it from his handling kept.

1

I.e., Arthur, who plays a role throughout the poem, usually appearing in the middle of each book, ready to make a crucial intervention in the plot in Canto Eight, as he does in Book Six, when he defeats Turpine. Arthur, the legendary British king, is due to marry Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, in Book Twelve. However, the poem does not reach this point and Arthur’s quest is never completed.

2 weft: floating. Again, the line suggests random and unplanned movement. 3 tyne: sorrow. 4 affect: affection. 5 spent: made. 6 couplement: pair. 7 dight: do, sort out. 8 hylding hound: worthless beast.

Canto Five

75

26 Gnashing his grinded teeth with griesly looke, And sparkling fire out of his furious eyne, Him with his fist unwares on th’head he strooke, That made him downe unto the earth encline; Whence soone upstarting much he gan repine,1 And laying hand upon his wrathfull blade, Thought therewithall forthwith him to have slaine, Who it perceiving, hand upon him layd, And greedily him griping, his avengement stayd. 27 With that aloude the faire Serena cryde Unto the Knight, them to dispart in twaine: Who to them stepping did them soone divide, And did from further violence restraine, Albe the wyld-man hardly would refraine. Then gan the Prince, of her for to demand, What and from whence she was, and by what traine2 She fell into that salvage villaines hand, And whether free with him she now were, or in band.3 28 To whom she thus; “I am, as now ye see, The wretchedst Dame, that live this day on ground, Who both in minde, the which most grieveth me, And body have receiv’d a mortall wound, That hath me driven to this drery stound. I was erewhile, the love of Calepine, Who whether he alive be to be found, Or by some deadly chaunce be done to pine,4 Since I him lately lost, uneath is to define.5 29 “In salvage forrest I him lost of late, Where I had surely long ere this bene dead, Or else remained in most wretched state, Had not this wylde man in that wofull stead6 Kept, and delivered me from deadly dread.7

1

repine: complain. traine: circumstances. 3 band: captivity. 4 done to pine: killed. 2

5

uneath is to define: difficult it is to know. 6 stead: place. 7 deadly dread: deadly fear.

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

In such a salvage wight, of brutish kynd, Amongst wilde beastes in desert forrests bred, It is most straunge and wonderfull to fynd So milde humanity, and perfect gentle mynd. 30 “Let me therefore this favour for him finde, That ye will not your wrath upon him wreake, Sith he cannot expresse his simple minde, Ne yours conceive, ne but by tokens1 speake: Small praise to prove your powre on wight so weake.” With such faire words she did their heate asswage, And the strong course of their displeasure breake, That they to pitty turnd their former rage, And each sought to supply the office of her page. 31 So having all things well about her dight, She on her way cast forward to proceede, And they her forth conducted, where they might Finde harbour fit to comfort her great neede. For now her wounds corruption2 gan to breed; And eke this Squire, who likewise wounded was Of that same Monster late, for lacke of heed,3 Now gan to faint, and further could not pas Through feeblenesse, which all his limbes oppressed has. 32 So forth they rode together all in troupe, To seeke some place, the which mote yeeld some ease To these sicke twaine, that now began to droupe, And all the way the Prince sought to appease The bitter anguish of their sharpe disease, By all the courteous meanes he could invent, Somewhile with merry purpose4 fit to please, And otherwhile with good encouragement, To make them to endure the pains, did them torment. 33 Mongst which, Serena did to him relate The foule discourt’sies and unknightly parts,5 Which Turpine had unto her shewed late, 1

4

2

5

tokens: signs and gestures. corruption: also means putrefaction. 3 heed: care.

purpose: conversation. parts: actions.

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Without compassion of her cruell smarts, Although Blandina did with all her arts Him otherwise perswade, all that she might; Yet he of malice, without her desarts,1 Not onely her excluded late at night, But also trayterously did wound her weary Knight. 34 Wherewith the Prince sore moved, there avoud, That soone as he returned backe againe, He would avenge th’abuses of that proud And shamefull Knight, of whom she did complaine. This wize did they each other entertaine, To passe the tedious travell of the way; Till towards night they came unto a plaine, By which a little Hermitage there lay, Far from all neighbourhood, the which annoy it may.2 35 And nigh thereto a little Chappell stoode, Which being all with Yvy overspred, Deckt all the roofe, and shadowing the roode,3 Seem’d like a grove faire braunched over hed: Therein the Hermite, which his life here led In streight4 observaunce of religious vow, Was wont his howres and holy things to bed;5 And therein he likewise was praying now, Whenas these Knights arriv’d, they wist not where nor how. 36 They stayd not there, but streight way in did pas. Whom when the Hermite present saw in place, From his devotion streight6 he troubled was; Which breaking off he toward them did pace, With stayed7 steps, and grave beseeming grace: For well it seem’d, that whilome he had beene

1

3

2

4

desarts: qualities. See Archimago’s Hermitage at I.i.34. Book Six represents and reuses many of the images and motifs in Book One––partly as a means of demonstrating how provisional that earlier vision of Faerie Land was, and partly as a means of showing how much has changed.

roode: cross. streight: strict. 5 howres: prayers at given times of the day; bed: offer. 6 streight: immediately. 7 stayed: steady.

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Some goodly person, and of gentle race, That could his good1 to all, and well did weene, How each to entertaine with curt’sie well beseene.2 37 And soothly it was sayd by common fame,3 So long as age enabled him thereto, That he had bene a man of mickle4 name, Renowmed much in armes and derring doe:5 But being aged now and weary to Of warres delight, and worlds contentious toyle, The name of knighthood he did disavow, And hanging up his armes and warlike spoyle, From all this worlds incombraunce did himselfe assoyle.6 38 He thence them led into his Hermitage, Letting their steedes to graze upon the greene: Small was his house, and like a little cage, For his owne turne,7 yet inly neate and clene, Deckt with greene boughes, and flowers gay beseene.8 Therein he them full faire did entertaine Not with such forged showes, as fitter beene For courting fooles, that curtesies would faine, But with entire9 affection and appearaunce plaine. 39 Yet was their fare but homely, such as hee Did use, his feeble body to sustaine; The which full gladly they did take in glee,10 Such as it was, ne did of want complaine, But being well suffiz’d, them rested faine.11 But faire Serene all night could take no rest, Ne yet that gentle Squire, for grievous paine Of their late woundes, the which the Blatant Beast Had given them, whose griefe through suffraunce12 sore increast. 1

could his good: knew how to behave well. 2 well beseene: pleasing, proper. 3 fame: report, rumor. 4 mickle: great. 5 derring doe: daring deeds, bravery. 6 assoyle: set free. The motif of a knight who becomes a hermit is common in ro-

mance literature, especially the grail legends. 7 turne: needs. 8 beseene: in appearance. 9 entire: sincere. 10 in glee: happily, with goodwill. 11 faine: gladly. 12 suffraunce: delay.

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40 So all that night they past in great disease,1 Till that the morning, bringing earely light To guide mens labours, brought them also ease, And some asswagement of their painefull plight. Then up they rose, and gan them selves to dight2 Unto their journey; but that Squire and Dame So faint and feeble were, that they ne might Endure to travell, nor one foote to frame:3 Their hearts were sicke, their sides were sore, their feete were lame. 41 Therefore the Prince, whom great affaires in mynd Would not permit, to make their lenger stay, Was forced there to leave them both behynd, In that good Hermits charge, whom he did pray To tend them well. So forth he went his way, And with him eke the salvage, that whyleare Seeing his royall usage and array,4 Was greatly growne in love of that brave pere, Would needes depart, as shall declared be elsewhere.

1 2

disease: discomfort. dight: prepare.

3 4

frame: support. usage and array: treatment and standing.

Canto Six The Hermite heales both Squire and dame Of their sore maladies: He1 Turpine doth defeate, and shame For his late villanies.

1

No wound, which warlike hand of enemy Inflicts with dint of sword, so sore doth light, As doth the poysnous sting, which infamy2 Infixeth in the name of noble wight: For by no art, nor any leaches3 might It ever can recured be againe; Ne all the skill, which that immortall spright Of Podalyrius4 did in it retaine, Can remedy such hurts; such hurts are hellish paine.5

2

Such were the wounds, the which that Blatant Beast Made in the bodies of that Squire and Dame; And being such, were now much more increast, For want of taking heede unto the same, That now corrupt and curelesse they became. Howbe6 that carefull Hermite did his best, With many kindes of medicines meete,7 to tame The poysnous humour, which did most infest8 Their ranckling wounds, and every day them duely drest.9

3

For he right well in Leaches craft was seene,10 And through the long experience of his dayes, Which had in many fortunes tossed beene, this book, as the last stanza (xii.41) demonstrates. 6 Howbe: nevertheless. 7 meete: proper, suitable.

1

He: Arthur. infamy: slander. 3 leaches: doctors. 4 Podalyrius: a doctor from the classical world, famous for curing a plague that had baffled all other doctors in the Greek camp during the Trojan War. 5 Slander is a theme that preoccupies Spenser in his later work, but especially in 2

8

infest: infect. duely drest: hard pressed. 10 seene: skilled. 9

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And past through many perillous assayes,1 He knew the diverse went2 of mortall wayes, And in the mindes of men had great insight; Which with sage counsell, when they went astray, He could enforme, and them reduce3 aright, And al the passions heale, which wound the weaker spright. 4

For whylome he had bene a doughty Knight, As any one, that lived in his daies, And proved oft in many perillous fight, Of which he grace and glory wonne alwaies, And in all battels bore away the baies.4 But being now attacht5 with timely age, And weary of this worlds unquiet waies, He tooke him selfe unto this Hermitage, In which he liv’d alone, like carelesse6 bird in cage.

5

One day, as he was searching7 of their wounds, He found that they had festred privily,8 And ranckling inward with unruly stounds,9 The inner parts now gan to putrify, That quite they seem’d past helpe of surgery, And rather needed to be disciplinde With holesome reede of sad10 sobriety, To rule the stubborne rage of passion blinde: Give salves to every sore, but counsell to the minde.

6

So taking them apart into his cell, He to that point fit speaches gan to frame, As he the art of words knew wondrous well, And eke could doe, as well as say the same, And thus he to them sayd; “faire daughter Dame, And you faire sonne, which here thus long now lie In piteous languor,11 since ye hither came,

1

7

2

8

assayes: trials. went: courses. 3 enforme: help, lead; reduce: restore. 4 baies: laurels. 5 attacht: attacked, seized. 6

carelesse: carefree.

searching: examining. privily: secretly. 9 unruly stounds: uncontrollable pains. 10 reede: advice; sad: sober, wise. 11 languor: illness.

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In vaine of me ye hope for remedie, And I likewise in vaine doe salves1 to you applie. 7

“For in your selfe your onely helpe doth lie, To heale your selves, and must proceed alone From your owne will, to cure your maladie. Who can him cure, that will be cur’d of none? If therefore health ye seeke, observe this one. First learne your outward sences to refraine From things, that stirre up fraile affection;2 Your eies, your eares, your tongue, your talk restraine From that they most affect, and in due termes containe.3

8

“For from those outward sences ill affected, The seede of all this evill first doth spring, Which at the first before it had infected, Mote easie be supprest with little thing: But being growen strong, it forth doth bring Sorrow, and anguish, and impatient4 paine In th’inner parts, and lastly scattering Contagious poyson close through every vaine, It never rests, till it have wrought his finall bane.5

9

“For that beastes teeth, which wounded you tofore,6 Are so exceeding venemous and keene, Made all of rusty yron, ranckling sore, That where they bite, it booteth not to weene7 With salve, or antidote, or other mene It ever to amend: ne marvaile ought; For that same beast was bred of hellish strene,8 And long in darksome Stygian9 den upbrought, Begot of foule Echidna,10 as in bookes is taught.

1

salves: remedies. affection: passion. 3 I.e., restrain yourself from that which will have worst effect on you, and contain your speech within proper limits. Such appeals for moderation between extremes are common in medical advice of the sixteenth century. 4 impatient: terrible, unendurable. 5 bane: destruction, death. 2

6

tofore: before. booteth: matters; weene: think. 8 strene: strain, race. 9 Stygian: of Styx, the river of Hell. Its waters were cold and venomous, causing instant death to anyone foolish enough to drink them. 10 Echidna: a celebrated monster produced from the union of Chrysaor, a son of Medusa, and Calirhee, daughter of Oceanus. 7

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10 “Echidna is a Monster direfull dred, Whom Gods doe hate, and heavens abhor to see; So hideous is her shape, so huge her hed, That even the hellish fiends affrighted bee At sight thereof, and from her presence flee: Yet did her face and former parts professe A faire young Mayden, full of comely glee; But all her hinder parts did plaine expresse A monstrous Dragon, full of fearefull uglinesse. 11 “To her the Gods, for her so dreadfull face,1 In fearefull darkenesse, furthest from the skie, And from the earth, appointed have her place, Mongst rocks and caves, where she enrold2 doth lie In hideous horrour and obscurity, Wasting the strength of her immortall age. There did Typhaon with her company,3 Cruell Typhaon, whose tempestuous rage Make th’heavens tremble oft, and him with vowes asswage. 12 “Of that commixtion they did then beget This hellish Dog, that hight the Blatant Beast; A wicked Monster, that his tongue doth whet4 Gainst all, both good and bad, both most and least, And poures his poysnous gall forth to infest The noblest wights with notable defame: Ne ever Knight, that bore so lofty creast, Ne ever Lady of so honest name, But he them spotted with reproch, or secrete shame. 13 “In vaine therefore it were, with medicine To goe about to salve such kynd of sore, That rather needes wise read5 and discipline, The upper half of her body was beautiful, but below the waist she was a serpent. 1

face: appearance. enrold: coiled. 3 Typhaon: a giant, one of the Titans, with a hundred heads of dragons and serpents. He waged war against the heavens as soon as he was born. His union with Echidna produced, among other monsters, Cerebus and 2

Geryoneo, who appears in The Faerie Queene, V.x. Typhaon is linked to both the Blatant Beast and Mutabilitie, and shows how dangerous the monsters are who threaten the shepherds in Book Six; company: copulate. 4 whet: sharpen. 5 read: advice.

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Then outward salves, that may augment it more.” “Aye me” (sayd then Serena sighing sore) “What hope of helpe doth then for us remaine, If that no salves1 may us to health restore?” “But sith we need good counsell” (sayd the swaine) “Aread2 good sire, some counsell, that may us sustaine.” 14 “The best” (sayd he) “that I can you advize, Is to avoide the occasion of the ill: For when the cause, whence evill doth arize, Removed is, th’effect surceaseth3 still. Abstaine from pleasure, and restraine your will, Subdue desire, and bridle loose delight, Use scanted diet, and forbeare your fill, Shun secresie, and talke in open sight: So shall you soone repaire your present evill plight.” 15 Thus having sayd, his sickely patients Did gladly hearken to his grave beheast,4 And kept so well his wise commaundements, That in short space their malady was ceast, And eke the biting of that harmefull Beast Was throughly heal’d. Tho when they did perceave Their wounds recur’d, and forces reincreast, Of that good Hermite both they tooke their leave, And went both on their way, ne ech would other leave. 16 But each th’other vow’d t’accompany, The Lady, for that she was much in dred, Now left alone in great extremity, The Squire, for that he courteous was indeed, Would not her leave alone in her great need. So both together traveld, till they met With a faire Mayden clad in mourning weed,5 Upon a mangy jade unmeetely set,6 And a lewd7 foole her leading thorough dry and wet.

1

salves: cures. Aread: give. 3 surceaseth: ceases, diminishes. 4 beheast: request, advice. 2

5

weed: clothes. jade: horse; unmeetely set: unsuitably equipped. 7 lewd: rude, bad. 6

Canto Six

17 But by what meanes that shame to her befell, And how thereof her selfe she did acquite, I must a while forbeare to you to tell; Till that, as comes by course, I doe recite, What fortune to the Briton Prince did lite,1 Pursuing that proud Knight, the which whileare2 Wrought to Sir Calepine so foule despight; And eke his Lady, though she sickely were, So lewdly3 had abusde, as ye did lately heare. 18 The Prince according to the former token,4 Which faire Serene to him delivered had, Pursu’d him streight, in mynd to bene ywroken5 Of all the vile demeane,6 and usage bad, With which he had those two so ill bestad:7 Ne wight with him on that adventure went, But that wylde man, whom though he oft forbad, Yet for no bidding, nor for being shent,8 Would he restrayned be from his attendement. 19 Arriving there,9 as did by chaunce befall, He found the gate wyde ope, and in he rode, Ne stayd, till that he came into the hall: Where soft dismounting like a weary lode, Upon the ground with feeble feete he trode, As he unable were for very neede To move one foote, but there must make abode; The whiles the salvage man did take his steede, And in some stable neare did set him up to feede. 20 Ere long to him a homely groome there came, That in rude wise him asked, what he was, That durst so boldly, without let10 or shame, Into his Lords forbidden hall to passe.

1

6

2

7

Briton Prince: Arthur; lite: happen. whileare: recently. The proud knight is Turpine. 3 lewdly: wickedly. 4 token: sign. 5 ywroken: revenged.

demeane: behavior. bestad: served. 8 shent: reproached. 9 there: Turpine’s castle. 10 let: obstacle.

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To whom the Prince, him fayning to embase,1 Mylde answer made; he was an errant Knight, The which was fall’n into this feeble case, Through many wounds, which lately he in fight, Received had, and prayd to pitty his ill plight. 21 But he, the more outrageous and bold, Sternely did bid him quickely thence avaunt,2 Or deare aby,3 for why his Lord of old Did hate all errant Knights, which there did haunt, Ne lodging would to any of them graunt, And therefore lightly bad him packe4 away, Not sparing him with bitter words to taunt; And therewithall rude hand on him did lay, To thrust him out of dore, doing his worst assay.5 22 Which when the Salvage comming now in place, Beheld, eftsoones6 he all enraged grew, And running streight upon that villaine base, Like a fell Lion at him fiercely flew, And with his teeth and nailes, in present vew, Him rudely rent,7 and all to peeces tore: So miserably him all helpelesse slew, That with the noise, whilest he did loudly rore, The people of the house rose forth in great uprore. 23 Who when on ground they saw their fellow slaine, And that same Knight and Salvage standing by, Upon them two they fell with might and maine, And on them layd so huge and horribly, As if they would have slaine them presently. But the bold Prince defended him so well, And their assault withstood so mightily, That maugre8 all their might, he did repell, And beat them back, whilest many underneath him fell.

1

fayning to embase: pretending to humiliate himself. 2 avaunt: advance; i.e., leave. 3 aby: suffer, pay the penalty. 4 lightly: quickly; packe: go (insulting).

5

assay: effort. eftsoones: immediately. 7 rent: push, repel. 8 maugre: despite. 6

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24 Yet he them still so sharpely did pursew, That few of them he left alive, which fled, Those evill tidings to their Lord to shew. Who hearing how his people badly sped,1 Came forth in hast: where when as with the dead He saw the ground all strow’d, and that same Knight And salvage with their bloud fresh steeming red, He woxe nigh mad with wrath and fell despight, And with reprochfull words him thus bespake on hight.2 25 “Art thou he, traytor, that with treason vile,3 Hast slaine my men in this unmanly maner, And now triumphest in the piteous spoile Of these poore folk, whose soules with black dishonor And foule defame doe decke thy bloudy baner? The meede4 whereof shall shortly be thy shame, And wretched end, which still attendeth on her.”5 With that him selfe to battell he did frame; So did his forty yeomen, which there with him came. 26 With dreadfull force they all did him assaile, And round about with boystrous strokes oppresse,6 That on his shield did rattle like to haile In a great tempest; that in such distresse, He wist not to which side him to addresse. And evermore that craven cowherd7 Knight, Was at his backe with heartlesse heedinesse,8 Wayting if he unwares him murther might: For cowardize doth still in villany delight. 27 Whereof whenas9 the Prince was well aware, He to him turnd with furious intent, And him against his powre gan to prepare; 1

sped: fared. on hight: loudly. 3 The most serious accusation that could be made. 4 meede: reward. 5 her: i.e., treason. 6 boystrous: violent, rough; oppresse: attack. 2

7

cowherd: a herder of cows; the pun makes the connection between birth and virtue, one the poem examines rather than accepts. 8 heedinesse: caution. 9 Whereof whenas: Therefore because.

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Like a fierce Bull, that being busie bent To fight with many foes about him ment,1 Feeling some curre behinde his heeles to bite, Turnes him about with fell2 avengement; So likewise turnde the Prince upon the Knight, And layd at him amaine with all his will and might. 28 Who when he once his dreadfull strokes had tasted,3 Durst not the furie of his force abyde, But turn’d abacke, and to retyre him hasted4 Through the thick prease,5 there thinking him to hyde. But when the Prince had once him plainely eyde, He foot by foot him followed alway, Ne would him suffer once to shrinke asyde But joyning close, huge lode at him did lay: Who flying still did ward, and warding fly away. 29 But when his foe he still so eger6 saw, Unto his heeles himselfe he did betake, Hoping unto some refuge to withdraw: Ne would the Prince him ever foot forsake, Where so he went, but after him did make. He fled from roome to roome, from place to place, Whylest every joynt for dread of death did quake, Still looking after him, that did him chace; That made him evermore increase his speedie pace. 30 At last he up into the chamber came, Whereas his love was sitting all alone, Wayting what tydings of her folke became. There did the Prince him overtake anone, Crying in vaine to her, him to bemone;7 And with his sword him on the head did smyte, That to the ground he fell in senselesse swone: Yet whether thwart8 or flatly it did lyte, The tempred steele did not into his braynepan byte.9 1

7

2

8

ment: joined, mixed, surrounded. fell: fierce. 3 tasted: felt. 4 hasted: hurried. 5 prease: crowd. 6 eger: fierce, keen for battle.

bemone: pity, plead for. thwart: across. 9 The doubt about the form of Arthur’s attack shows that the rules of courteous battle are receding and that all knights, whether good or bad, are trying to kill each other. In romance, it was usually a sign of a

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31 Which when the Ladie saw, with great affright She starting up, began to shrieke aloud, And with her garment covering him from sight, Seem’d under her protection him to shroud; And falling lowly at his feet, her bowd Upon her knee, intreating him for grace, And often him besought, and prayd, and vowd; That with the ruth of her so wretched case, He stayd his second strooke, and did his hand abase.1 32 Her weed2 she then withdrawing, did him discover, Who now come to himselfe, yet would not rize, But still did lie as dead, and quake, and quiver, That even the Prince his basenesse did despize, And eke his Dame him seeing in such guize, Gan him recomfort, and from ground to reare. Who rising up at last in ghastly wize, Like troubled ghost did dreadfully3 appeare, As one that had no life him left through former feare.4 33 Whom when the Prince so deadly saw dismayd, He for such basenesse shamefully him shent,5 And with sharpe words did bitterly upbrayd; “Vile cowheard dogge, now doe I much repent, That ever I this life unto thee lent, Whereof thou caytive6 so unworthie art; That both thy love, for lacke of hardiment, And eke thy selfe, for want of manly hart, And eke all knights hast shamed with this knightlesse part.7 34 “Yet further hast thou heaped shame to shame, And crime to crime, by this thy cowheard feare. For first it was to thee reprochfull blame, To erect this wicked custome, which I heare,

knight’s lack of virtue if he sought to kill his opponents. 1 abase: lower. Turpine is humiliated in every way possible. Again, the episode is not without humor. 2 weed: dress. 3 dreadfully: terrified.

4 Turpine ceases to be human and becomes a representation of baseness. Compare the fate of Malbecco, the figure of jealousy, at III.x.60. 5 shent: disgraced. 6 caytive: villain. 7 part: conduct.

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Gainst errant Knights and Ladies thou dost reare;1 Whom when thou mayst, thou dost of arms despoile, Or of their upper garment, which they weare: Yet doest thou not with manhood, but with guile Maintaine this evill use, thy foes thereby to foile. 35 “And lastly in approvance2 of thy wrong, To shew such faintnesse and foule cowardize, Is greatest shame: for oft it falles, that strong And valiant knights doe rashly enterprize, Either for fame, or else for exercize, A wrongfull quarrell to maintaine by right; Yet have, through prowesse and their brave emprize,3 Gotten great worship in this worldes sight. For greater force there needs to maintaine wrong, then right.4 36 “Yet since thy life unto this Ladie fayre I given have, live in reproch and scorne; Ne ever armes, ne ever knighthood dare Hence to professe: for shame is to adorne With so brave badges one so basely borne;5 But onely breath sith that I did forgive.”6 So having from his craven bodie torne Those goodly armes,7 he them away did give And onely suffred him this wretched life to live. 37 There whilest he thus was setling things above, Atwene that Ladie myld and recreant knight, To whom his life he graunted for her love, He gan bethinke him, in what perilous plight He had behynd him left that salvage wight,8 Amongst so many foes, whom sure he thought By this quite slaine in so unequall fight: Therefore descending backe in haste, he sought If yet he were alive, or to destruction brought. 1

reare: practice. approvance: proof. 3 emprize: undertaking. 4 This would mean that right must be backed up by force if it is to combat wrong. 5 basely borne: here meaning behaved basely, rather than of low birth. 2

6

I.e., you are only alive because I spared you. 7 Knights were shamed and demoted by having their livery taken away. 8 wight: person.

Canto Six

38 There he him found environed about With slaughtred bodies, which his hand had slaine, And laying yet a fresh with courage stout Upon the rest, that did alive remaine; Whom he likewise right sorely did constraine, Like scattred sheepe, to seeke for safetie, After he gotten had with busie paine Some of their weapons, which thereby did lie, With which he layd about, and made them fast to flie. 39 Whom when the Prince so felly1 saw to rage, Approching to him neare, his hand he stayd, And sought, by making signes, him to asswage:2 Who them perceiving, streight to him obayd, As to his Lord, and downe his weapons layd, As if he long had to his heasts3 bene trayned. Thence he him brought away, and up convayd Into the chamber, where that Dame remayned With her unworthy knight, who ill him entertayned. 40 Whom when the Salvage saw from daunger free, Sitting beside his Ladie there at ease, He well remembred, that the same was hee, Which lately sought his Lord for to displease: Tho4 all in rage, he on him streight did seaze, As if he would in peeces him have rent; And were not, that the Prince did him appeaze, He had not left one limbe of him unrent: But streight he held his hand at his commaundement. 41 Thus having all things well in peace ordayned,5 The Prince himselfe there all that night did rest, Where him Blandina fayrely entertayned, With all the courteous glee and goodly feast, The which for him she could imagine best. For well she knew the wayes to win good will

1

3

2

4

felly: fiercely. asswage: calm, stop. The Salvage Man’s basic fury is released. Exaggerated by lack of education, he lives in terms of natural extremes of goodwill and hatred of evil.

heasts: commands. Tho: then. 5 ordayned: established.

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Of every wight, that were not too infest;1 And how to please the minds of good and ill, Through tempering of her words and lookes by wondrous skill.2 42 Yet were her words and lookes but false and fayned,3 To some hid end to make more easie way, Or to allure such fondlings, whom she trayned4 Into her trap unto their owne decay: Thereto, when needed, she could weepe and pray, And when her listed,5 she could fawne and flatter; Now smyling smoothly, like to sommers day, Now glooming sadly, so to cloke her matter; Yet were her words but wynd, and all her teares but water. 43 Whether such grace were given her by kynd,6 As women wont their guilefull wits to guyde; Or learn’d the art to please, I doe not fynd. This well I wote, that she so well applyde Her pleasing tongue, that soone she pacifyde The wrathfull Prince, and wrought her husbands peace. Who nathelesse not therewith satisfyde, His rancorous despight did not releasse,7 Ne secretly from thought of fell revenge surceasse.8 44 For all that night, the whyles the Prince did rest In carelesse9 couch, not weeting what was ment, He watcht in close awayt with weapons prest,10 Willing to worke his villenous intent On him, that had so shamefully him shent:11 Yet durst he not for very cowardize Effect the same, whylest12 all the night was spent. The morrow next the Prince did early rize, And passed forth, to follow his first enterprize. 1

infest: hostile. Blandina represents a clear link between ideas of courtesy as appropriate speech and insincerity, qualifying earlier descriptions of Calidore’s skills in the persuasive arts. 3 fayned: false, pretend. 4 fondlings: fools; trayned: beguiled. 5 listed: chose, liked. 2

6

kynd: nature. despight: hatred; releasse: end, moderate. 8 surceasse: end, stop. 9 carelesse: free from care. 10 close awayt: secret ambush; prest: ready. 11 shent: injured. 12 whylest: until. 7

Canto Seven Turpine is baffuld,1 his two knights doe gaine their treasons meed,2 Fayre Mirabellaes punishment for loves disdaine decreed.

1

Like as the gentle hart it selfe bewrayes,3 In doing gentle deedes with franke delight, Even so the baser mind it selfe displayes, In cancred4 malice and revengefull spight. For to maligne, t’envie, t’use shifting slight,5 Be arguments of a vile donghill mind, Which what it dare not doe by open might, To worke by wicked treason wayes doth find, By such discourteous deeds discovering his base kind.

2

That well appeares in this discourteous knight, The coward Turpine, whereof now I treat;6 Who notwithstanding that in former fight He of the Prince his life received late, Yet in his mind malitious and ingrate7 He gan devize, to be aveng’d anew For all that shame, which kindled inward hate. Therefore so soone as he was out of vew, Himselfe in hast he arm’d, and did him fast pursew.

3

Well did he tract8 his steps, as he did ryde, Yet would not neare approch in daungers eye, But kept aloofe for dread to be descryde,9 Untill fit time and place he mote espy, Where he mote worke him scath and villeny.10

1

6

2

7

baffuld: disgraced. meed: reward. 3 bewrayes: betrays, reveals. 4 cancred: venomous, corrupt. 5 slight: deceit.

treat: speak. ingrate: ungrateful. 8 tract: trace. 9 descryde: discovered. 10 scath: harm; villeny: injury.

93

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At last he met two knights to him unknowne, The which were arm’d both agreeably,1 And both combynd, what ever chaunce were blowne, Betwixt them to divide, and each to make his owne. 4

To whom false Turpine comming courteously,2 To cloke the mischiefe, which he inly ment, Gan to complaine of great discourtesie, Which a straunge knight, that neare afore him went, Had doen to him, and his deare Ladie shent:3 Which if they would afford him ayde at need For to avenge, in time convenient, They should accomplish both a knightly deed, And for their paines obtaine of him a goodly meed.

5

The knights beleev’d, that all he sayd, was trew, And being fresh and full of youthly spright,4 Were glad to heare of that adventure new, In which they mote make triall of their might, Which never yet they had approv’d5 in fight; And eke desirous of the offred meed,6 Said then the one of them; “Where is that wight, The which hath doen to thee this wrongfull deed, That we may it avenge, and punish him with speed?”

6

“He rides” (said Turpine) “there not farre afore, With a wyld man soft footing by his syde, That if ye list to haste a litle more, Ye may him overtake in timely tyde:” Eftsoones they pricked forth7 with forward pryde, And ere that litle while they ridden had,

1

agreeably: similarly. courteously: now used as meaning false, deceptive––a definition that has developed as Book Six has progressed. Turpine actually reverses the truth and pretends that he is the courteous knight. 3 shent: shamed. 2

4

spright: spirit. approv’d: proved. 6 This line undercuts the previous statements and suggests that knights are not necessarily as virtuous and courteous as they think they are. 7 pricked forth: rode out. 5

Canto Seven

95

The gentle Prince not farre away they spyde, Ryding a softly pace with portance1 sad, Devizing2 of his love more, then of daunger drad. 7

Then one of them aloud unto him cryde, Bidding him turne againe, false traytour knight, Foule womanwronger, for he him defyde. With that they both at once with equall spight Did bend their speares, and both with equall might Against him ran; but th’one did misse his marke, And being carried with his force forthright,3 Glaunst swiftly by; like to that heavenly sparke, Which glyding through the ayre lights all the heavens darke.

8

But th’other ayming better, did him smite Full in the shield, with so impetuous powre, That all his launce in peeces shivered quite, And scattered all about, fell on the flowre.4 But the stout Prince, with much more steddy stowre5 Full on his bever6 did him strike so sore, That the cold steele through piercing, did devowre His vitall breath, and to the ground him bore, Where still he bathed lay in his owne bloody gore.

9

As when a cast7 of Faulcons make their flight At an Herneshaw,8 that lyes aloft on wing, The whyles they strike at him with heedlesse9 might, The warie foule his bill doth backward wring;10 On which the first, whose force her first doth bring, Her selfe quite through the bodie doth engore,11 And falleth downe to ground like senselesse thing, But th’other not so swift, as she before, Fayles of her souse,12 and passing by doth hurt no more.

1

8

2

9

softly: slow; portance: appearance. Devizing: thinking. 3 forthright: immediately. 4 flowre: floor. 5 stowre: blow. 6 bever: the lower part of a helmet. 7 cast: pair.

Herneshaw: young heron. heedlesse: careless, unrestrained. 10 wring: turn. 11 engore: pierce. 12 souse: swoop. Again we are reminded that nature can be cruel and violent, and the poem forces us to consider the relationship between nature and courtesy.

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10 By this the other, which was passed by, Himselfe recovering, was return’d to fight; Where when he saw his fellow lifelesse ly, He much was daunted with so dismall sight; Yet nought abating of his former spight, Let drive at him with so malitious mynd, As if he would have passed through him quight: But the steele-head no stedfast hold could fynd, But glauncing by, deceiv’d him of that he desynd. 11 Not so the Prince: for his well learned1 speare Tooke surer hould, and from his horses backe Above a launces length him forth did beare, And gainst the cold hard earth so sore him strake, That all his bones in peeces nigh he brake. Where seeing him so lie, he left his steed, And to him leaping, vengeance thought to take Of him, for all his former follies meed,2 With flaming sword in hand his terror more to breed.3 12 The fearefull swayne beholding death so nie, Cryde out aloud for mercie him to save; In lieu whereof he would to him descrie,4 Great treason to him meant, his life to reave.5 The Prince soone hearkned, and his life forgave. Then thus said he, “There is a straunger knight, The which for promise of great meed, us drave To this attempt, to wreake his hid despight, For that himselfe thereto did want sufficient might.” 13 The Prince much mused6 at such villenie, And sayd; “Now sure ye well have earn’d your meed, For th’one is dead, and th’other soone shall die, Unlesse to me thou hether bring with speed The wretch, that hyr’d you to this wicked deed.” He glad of life, and willing eke to wreake

1

4

2

5

learned: trained. follies meed: reward of foolishness. 3 I.e., to make his fear grow more through his flashing sword.

descrie: reveal. reave: take away. 6 mused: surprised.

Canto Seven

97

The guilt on him, which did this mischiefe breed, Swore by his sword, that neither day nor weeke He would surceasse,1 but him, where so he were, would seeke. 14 So up he2 rose, and forth streight way he went Backe to the place, where Turpine late he lore;3 There he him found in great astonishment, To see him so bedight with bloodie gore, And griesly wounds that him appalled sore. Yet thus at length he said, “how now Sir knight? What meaneth this, which here I see before? How fortuneth this foule uncomely plight, So different from that, which earst ye seem’d in sight?” 15 “Perdie”4 (said he) “in evill houre it fell, That ever I for meed did undertake So hard a taske, as life for hyre5 to sell; The which I earst adventur’d for your sake. Witnesse the wounds, and this wyde bloudie lake, Which ye may see yet all about me steeme. Therefore now yeeld, as ye did promise make, My due reward, the which right well I deeme6 I yearned have, that life so dearely did redeeme.”7 16 “But where then is” (quoth he halfe wrothfully) “Where is the bootie, which therefore I bought, That cursed caytive, my strong enemy, That recreant knight, whose hated life I sought? And where is eke your friend, which halfe it ought?”8 “He lyes” (said he) “upon the cold bare ground, Slayne of that errant knight, with whom he fought; Whom afterwards my selfe with many a wound Did slay againe, as ye may see there in the stound.”9

1

surceasse: stop, cease. he: Timias. 3 lore: left, lost. 4 Perdie: indeed. 5 hyre: wages. 6 deeme: think. 2

7 redeeme: save. Ironically, and against the intentions of the knights, this is actually true and the use of a cliché is justified. 8 ought: owns. 9 againe: in revenge (a lie, of course); in the stound: in that place.

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17 Thereof false Turpin was full glad and faine,1 And needs with him streight to the place would ryde, Where he himselfe might see his foeman2 slaine; For else his feare could not be satisfyde. So as they rode, he saw the way all dyde With streames of bloud; which tracting3 by the traile, Ere long they came, whereas in evill tyde4 That other swayne, like ashes deadly pale, Lay in the lap of death, rewing his wretched bale.5 18 Much did the Craven6 seeme to mone his case, That for his sake his deare life had forgone; And him bewayling with affection base, Did counterfeit kind pittie, where was none: For wheres no courage, theres no ruth nor mone.7 Thence passing forth, not farre away he found, Whereas the Prince himselfe lay all alone, Loosely displayd upon the grassie ground, Possessed of sweete sleepe, that luld him soft in swound.8 19 Wearie of travell9 in his former fight, He there in shade himselfe had layd to rest, Having his armes and warlike things undight,10 Fearelesse of foes that mote his peace molest; The whyles his salvage page, that wont be prest,11 Was wandred in the wood another way, To doe some thing, that seemed to him best, The whyles his Lord in silver12 slomber lay, Like to the Evening starre adorn’d with deawy ray. 20 Whom when as Turpin saw so loosely layd, He weened13 well, that he in deed was dead, Like as that other knight to him had sayd: 1

faine: pleased. foeman: enemy. 3 tracting: tracking. 4 tyde: time. 5 rewing: lamenting, repenting; bale: injury, fate. 6 Craven: coward. 7 mone: grief. 2

8

swound: faint, unconsciousness. travell: work. 10 undight: taken off 11 wont be prest: was usually near. 12 silver: deep, pure; associated with the moon. 13 weened: thought, supposed. 9

Canto Seven

99

But when he nigh approcht, he mote aread Plaine signes in him of life and livelihead. Whereat much griev’d against that straunger knight, That him too light of credence did mislead, He would have backe retyred from that sight, That was to him on earth the deadliest despight.1 21 But that same knight would not once let him start,2 But plainely gan to him declare the case Of all his mischiefe, and late lucklesse smart; How both he and his fellow there in place Were vanquished, and put to foule disgrace, And how that he in lieu of life him lent, Had vow’d unto the victor, him to trace And follow through the world, where so he went, Till that he him delivered to his punishment. 22 He3 therewith much abashed and affrayd, Began to tremble every limbe and vaine; And softly whispering him, entyrely4 prayd, T’advize him better, then by such a traine5 Him to betray unto a straunger swaine:6 Yet rather counseld him contrarywize, Sith he likewise did wrong by him sustaine, To joyne with him and vengeance to devize, Whylest time did offer meanes him sleeping to surprize. 23 Nathelesse for all his speach, the gentle knight Would not be tempted to such villenie, Regarding more his faith, which he did plight,7 All were it to his mortall enemie, Then to entrap him by false treacherie: Great shame in lieges blood to be embrew’d.8

1

despight: fear, malice, worst thing possible. 2 start: escape. 3 He: Turpine. 4 entyrely: honestly, sincerely.

5

traine: trick. swaine: youth. 7 plight: promise, pledge. 8 lieges: an ally to whom a promise has been made; embrew’d: stained. 6

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Thus whylest they were debating diverslie,1 The Salvage forth out of the wood issew’d Backe to the place, whereas his Lord he sleeping vew’d. 24 There when he saw those two so neare him stand, He doubted2 much what mote their meaning bee, And throwing downe his load out of his hand, To weet great store of forrest frute, which hee Had for his food late gathered from the tree, Himselfe unto his weapon he betooke, That was an oaken plant,3 which lately hee Rent4 by the root; which he so sternely shooke, That like an hazell wand, it quivered and quooke. 25 Whereat the Prince awaking, when he spyde The traytour Turpin with that other knight, He started up, and snatching neare his syde His trustie sword, the servant of his might, Like a fell Lyon leaped to him light, And his left hand upon his collar layd. Therewith the cowheard deaded with affright, Fell flat to ground, ne word unto him sayd, But holding up his hands, with silence mercie prayd. 26 But he so full of indignation was, That to his prayer nought he would incline, But as he lay upon the humbled gras,5 His foot he set on his vile necke, in signe Of servile yoke, that nobler harts repine.6 Then letting him arise like abject thrall, He gan to him object7 his haynous crime, And to revile, and rate, and recreant call, And lastly to despoyle of knightly bannerall.8

1

diverslie: in different ways, distracting. doubted: worried. 3 plant: young tree. 4 Rent: tore up. 5 I.e., as he lay humbled on the grass. 2

6

repine: object to. object: reproach, accuse. 8 bannerall: banderol, a pennant that was attached to a knight’s lance as a mark of chivalry. 7

Canto Seven

101

27 And after all, for greater infamie, He by the heeles him hung upon a tree,1 And baffuld2 so, that all which passed by, The picture of his punishment might see, And by the like ensample warned bee, How ever they through treason doe trespasse. But turne we now backe to that Ladie free, Whom late we left ryding upon an Asse, Led by a Carle and foole, which by her side did passe.3 28 She was a Ladie of great dignitie, And lifted up to honorable place, Famous through all the land of Faerie, Though of meane parentage and kindred base, Yet deckt with wondrous giftes of natures grace, That all men did her person much admire, And praise the feature of her goodly face, The beames whereof did kindle lovely fire In th’harts of many a knight, and many a gentle squire.4 29 But she thereof grew proud and insolent,5 That none she worthie thought to be her fere,6 But scornd them all, that love unto her ment; Yet was she lov’d of many a worthy pere, Unworthy she to be belov’d so dere, That could not weigh of worthinesse aright. For beautie is more glorious bright and clere, The more it is admir’d of many a wight, And noblest she, that served is of noblest knight. 30 But this coy Damzell thought contrariwize, That such proud looks would make her praysed more; And that the more she did all love despize, The more would wretched lovers her adore. What cared she, who sighed for her sore, Or who did wayle or watch the wearie night? 1

A particularly shameful punishment. baffuld: disgraced. 3 All signs of her shame. We first saw Mirabella at vi.16, hence the reference to turning back in line 7. 2

4 We now have an example of a beautiful woman of low birth to help us explore our ideas of virtue and birth. 5 insolent: haughty. 6 fere: partner.

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Let them that list,1 their lucklesse lot deplore; She was borne free, not bound to any wight, And so would ever live, and love her owne delight. 31 Through such her stubborne stifnesse, and hard hart, Many a wretch, for want of remedie, Did languish long in lifeconsuming smart,2 And at the last through dreary dolour3 die: Whylest she, the Ladie of her libertie, Did boast her beautie had such soveraine might, That with the onely twinckle of her eye, She could or save, or spill,4 whom she would hight. What could the Gods doe more, but doe it more aright? 32 But loe the Gods, that mortall follies vew, Did worthily revenge this maydens pride; And nought regarding her so goodly hew,5 Did laugh at her, that many did deride, Whilest she did weepe, of no man mercifide.6 For on a day, when Cupid kept his court, As he is wont at each Saint Valentide, Unto the which all lovers doe resort, That of their loves successe they there may make report. 33 It fortun’d then, that when the roules7 were red, In which the names of all loves folke were fyled, That many there were missing, which were ded, Or kept in bands,8 or from their loves exyled, Or by some other violence despoyled. Which when as Cupid heard, he wexed wroth, And doubting9 to be wronged, or beguyled, He bad his eyes to be unblindfold both,10 That he might see his men, and muster them by oth.11 1

list: wanted to. smart: pain. 3 dolour: misery. 4 spill: kill. 5 hew: appearance. 6 mercifide: pitied. 7 roules: records. 8 in bands: captivity. 9 doubting: fearing. 2

10

Cupid, the god of love, was usually represented as blind, like Fortune, as love would strike randomly. Cupid was not generally seen as the cute, mischievous little boy as he is now, but a powerful, willful, and cruel youth, happy to ruin lives if the mood took him. 11 Cupid seizes control and decides not simply to let events take their course. Given the stress on wandering and the random

Canto Seven

103

34 Then found he many missing of his crew, Which wont1 doe suit and service to his might; Of whom what was becomen, no man knew. Therefore a Jurie was impaneld streight, T’enquire of them, whether by force, or sleight,2 Or their owne guilt, they were away convayd. To whom foule Infamie, and fell Despight3 Gave evidence, that they were all betrayd, And murdred cruelly by a rebellious Mayd. 35 Fayre Mirabella4 was her name, whereby Of all those crymes she there indited was: All which when Cupid heard, he by and by5 In great displeasure, wild a Capias6 Should issue forth, t’attach that scornefull lasse. The warrant straight was made, and therewithall A Baylieffe errant forth in post7 did passe, Whom they by name there Portamore8 did call; He which doth summon lovers to loves judgement hall. 36 The damzell was attacht,9 and shortly brought Unto the barre, whereas she was arrayned: But she thereto nould plead, nor answere ought10 Even for stubborne pride, which her restrayned. So judgement past, as is by law ordayned In cases like, which when at last she saw, Her stubborne hart, which love before disdayned, Gan stoupe, and falling downe with humble awe, Cryde mercie, to abate the extremitie of law. 37 The sonne of Venus who is myld by kynd,11 But where he is provokt with peevishnesse,12 Unto her prayers piteously enclynd, nature of events in the poem, this is a significant development. 1 wont: were accustomed. 2 sleight: trickery. 3 Infamie: slander; fell Despight: cruel malice. 4 Mirabella: marvelous beauty. 5 by and by: straight away. 6 wild: willed; Capias: writ.

7

Baylieffe: officer of justice; in post: in haste.

8

Portamore: messenger of love. attacht: seized, apprehended. 10 The failure to plead signals her guilt. 11 kynd: nature. 12 peevishnesse: perversity. 9

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And did the rigour of his doome represse;1 Yet not so freely, but that nathelesse He unto her a penance did impose, Which was, that through this worlds wyde wildernes She wander should in companie of those, Till she had sav’d so many loves, as she did lose.2 38 So now she had bene wandring two whole yeares Throughout the world, in this uncomely3 case, Wasting her goodly hew4 in heavie teares, And her good dayes in dolorous5 disgrace: Yet had she not in all these two yeares space, Saved but two, yet in two yeares before, Throgh her dispiteous pride, whilest love lackt place,6 She had destroyed two and twenty more. Aie me, how could her love make half amends therefore. 39 And now she was uppon the weary way, When as the gentle Squire, with faire Serene, Met her in such misseeming7 foule array; The whiles that mighty man did her demeane8 With all the evill termes and cruell meane,9 That he could make; And eeke that angry foole Which follow’d her, with cursed hands uncleane Whipping her horse, did with his smarting toole Oft whip her dainty selfe, and much augment her doole.10 40 Ne ought it mote availe her to entreat The one or th’other, better her to use: For both so wilfull were and obstinate, That all her piteous plaint they did refuse, And rather did the more her beate and bruse. But most the former11 villaine, which did lead 1

doome: judgment; represse: reinforce. the task set the rapist knight in Chaucer’s Wife of Bath’s Tale where he has to find out what a woman really wants as a punishment for his crime. 3 uncomely: unpleasant, demeaning. 4 hew: appearance. 2 lose: destroy. The story is a reversal of

5

dolorous: sad. love lackt place: love had no place (in her heart). 7 misseeming: unseemly, unbecoming. 8 demeane: mistreat. 9 meane: means. 10 doole: grief, sorrow. 11 former: chief. 6

Canto Seven

105

Her tyreling jade,1 was bent her to abuse; Who though she were with wearinesse nigh dead, Yet would not let her lite, nor rest a little stead.2 41 For he was sterne,3 and terrible by nature, And eeke of person huge and hideous, Exceeding much the measure of mans stature, And rather like a Gyant monstruous. For sooth he was descended of the hous Of those old Gyants, which did warres darraine4 Against the heaven in order battailous, And sib to great Orgolio,5 which was slaine By Arthure, when as Unas Knight he did maintaine.6 42 His lookes were dreadfull, and his fiery eies Like two great Beacons, glared bright and wyde, Glauncing askew,7 as if his enemies He scorned in his overweening pryde; And stalking stately like a Crane, did stryde At every step uppon the tiptoes hie, And all the way he went, on every syde He gaz’d about, and stared horriblie, As if he with his lookes would all men terrifie. 43 He wore no armour, ne for none did care, As no whit dreading any living wight; But in a Jacket quilted richly rare, Upon checklaton8 he was straungely dight, And on his head a roll of linnen plight,9 Like to the Mores of Malaber10 he wore; 1

7

2

8

tyreling jade: tiring horse. stead: while, time. 3 sterne: cruel. 4 old Gyants: the Titans; darraine: wage. 5 sib: sibling, brother; Orgolio: the giant who defeated and imprisoned the Redcrosse Knight at I.vii–viii, another explicit link that refers the reader back to the events of Book One. 6 maintaine: act. The syntax is ambiguous and it is not clear whether Arthur or the Redcrosse Knight acts as Una’s knight.

Glauncing askew: looking sideways. checklaton: ciclaton, an expensive medieval cloth of gold or silk. 9 plight: folded. 10 Mores of Malaber: inhabitants of western India. Spenser may have in mind Saracens, like Sansloy, Sansjoy, and Sansfoy in Book One, common figures in romances. Or he may be following travel books of voyages to Asia.

106

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With which his locks, as blacke as pitchy night, Were bound about, and voyded from before,1 And in his hand a mighty yron club he bore. 44 This was Disdaine, who led that Ladies horse Through thick and thin, through mountains and through plains, Compelling her, wher she would not by force, Haling2 her palfrey by the hempen raines. But that same foole, which most increast her paines, Was Scorne, who having in his hand a whip, Her therewith yirks,3 and still when she complaines, The more he laughes, and does her closely quip,4 To see her sore lament, and bite her tender lip. 45 Whose cruell handling when that Squire beheld, And saw those villaines her so vildely use, His gentle heart with indignation sweld, And could no lenger beare so great abuse, As such a Lady so to beate and bruse; But to him stepping, such a stroke him lent,5 That forst him th’halter from his hand to loose, And maugre6 all his might, backe to relent: Else had he surely there bene slaine, or fowly shent. 46 The villaine wroth7 for greeting him so sore, Gathered him selfe together soone againe, And with his yron batton, which he bore, Let drive at him so dreadfully amaine,8 That for his safety he did him constraine To give him ground, and shift to every side, Rather then once his burden to sustaine: For bootelesse9 thing him seemed, to abide, So mighty blowes, or prove the puissaunce of his pride.

1

voyded from before: swept back to keep his face clear of hair. 2 Haling: pulling, dragging. 3 yirks: afflicts, torments. 4 closely quip: secretly taunt.

5

lent: gave. maugre: in spite of. 7 wroth: angry. 8 amaine: at once. 9 bootelesse: pointless, fruitless. 6

Canto Seven

107

47 Like as a Mastiffe1 having at a bay A salvage Bull, whose cruell hornes doe threat Desperate daunger, if he them assay, Traceth his ground, and round about doth beat, To spy where he may some advauntage get; The whiles the beast doth rage and loudly rore, So did the Squire, the whiles the Carle did fret, And fume in his disdainefull mynd the more, And oftentimes by Turmagant and Mahound2 swore. 48 Nathelesse so sharpely still he him pursewd, That at advantage him at last he tooke, When his foote slipt (that slip he dearely rewd,)3 And with his yron club to ground him strooke; Where still he lay, ne out of swoune awooke, Till heavy hand the Carle upon him layd, And bound him fast: Tho when he up did looke, And saw him selfe captiv’d, he was dismayd, Ne powre had to withstand, ne hope of any ayd. 49 Then up he made him4 rise, and forward fare, Led in a rope, which both his hands did bynd; Ne ought that foole for pitty did him spare, But with his whip him following behynd, Him often scourg’d, and forst his feete to fynd:5 And other whiles with bitter mockes and mowes6 He would him scorne, that to his gentle mynd Was much more grievous, then the others blowes: Words sharpely wound, but greatest griefe of scorning growes.7 50 The faire Serena, when she saw him fall Under that villaines club, then surely thought That slaine he was, or made a wretched thrall,

1 Mastiffe: a huge, fierce dog often used for hunting. 2 Turmagant and Mahound: a Saracen God and Mohammed. 3 rewd: regretted. 4 him: Timias, who has been defeated by Disdain.

5

I.e., to stand up. mowes: grimaces. 7 Spenser again emphasizes that slander does more damage than anything else. 6

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And fled away with all the speede she mought, To seeke for safety, which long time she sought: And past through many perils by the way, Ere she againe to Calepine was brought; The which discourse as now I must delay, Till Mirabellaes fortunes I doe further say.

Canto Eight Prince Arthure overcomes Disdaine, Quites1 Mirabell from dreed: Serena found of Salvages, By Calepine is freed.

1

Ye gentle Ladies, in whose soveraine powre Love hath the glory of his kingdome left, And th’hearts of men, as your eternall dowre,2 In yron chaines, of liberty bereft, Delivered hath into your hands by gift; Be well aware, how ye the same doe use, That pride doe not to tyranny you lift; Least if men you of cruelty accuse, He from you take that chiefedome, which ye doe abuse.3

2

And as ye soft and tender are by kynde, Adornd with goodly gifts of beauties grace, So be ye soft and tender eeke4 in mynde; But cruelty and hardnesse from you chace, That all your other praises will deface, And from you turne the love of men to hate. Ensample take of Mirabellaes case, Who from the high degree of happy state, Fell into wretched woes, which she repented late.5

3

Who after thraldome of the gentle Squire, Which she beheld with lamentable6 eye, Was touched with compassion entire,7

1

Quites: frees. dowre: dowry. 3 chiefedome: kingdom. The opening stanza reminds readers of the tradition of Petrarchan poetry that habitually represented women as cruel and unobtainable. 2

Spenser explores this tradition in his own sonnet sequence, the Amoretti. 4 eeke: also. 5 late: too late. 6 lamentable: pitying. 7 entire: sincere.

109

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The Faerie Queene: Book Six

And much lamented his calamity, That for her sake fell into misery: Which booted nought1 for prayers, nor for threat To hope for to release or mollify; For aye the more, that she did them entreat The more they him misust,2 and cruelly did beat. 4

So as they forward on their way did pas, Him still reviling and afflicting sore, They met Prince Arthure with Sir Enias,3 (That was that courteous Knight, whom he before Having subdew’d, yet did to life restore,) To whom as they approcht, they gan augment Their cruelty, and him to punish more, Scourging and haling4 him more vehement; As if 5 it them should grieve to see his punishment.

5

The Squire him selfe when as he saw his Lord, The witnesse of his wretchednesse, in place, Was much asham’d, that with an hempen cord He like a dog was led in captive case, And did his head for bashfulnesse abase,6 As loth to see, or to be seene at all: Shame would be hid. But whenas Enias Beheld two such, of two such villaines thrall, His manly mynde was much emmoved7 therewithall.

6

And to the Prince thus sayd; “See you Sir Knight, The greatest shame that ever eye yet saw? Yond Lady and her Squire with foule despight Abusde, against all reason and all law, Without regard of pitty or of awe. See how they doe that Squire beat and revile;8

1 Which booted nought: which was not influenced by. 2 misust: misused. 3 Enias: the significance of his name is not clear, but it may refer to restraint or be a version of Aeneas.

4

haling: pulling, dragging. As if: with the sense of “although.” 6 bashfulnesse abase: shame hang down. 7 emmoved: moved, affected. 8 revile: insult. 5

Canto Eight

111

See how they doe the Lady hale and draw.1 But if ye please to lend me leave a while, I will them soone acquite, and both of blame assoile.”2 7

The Prince assented, and then he streight way Dismounting light,3 his shield about him threw, With which approching, thus he gan to say; “Abide ye caytive treachetours4 untrew, That have with treason thralled unto you These two, unworthy of your wretched bands; And now your crime with cruelty pursew. Abide, and from them lay your loathly hands; Or else abide the death, that hard before you stands.”

8

The villaine stayd not aunswer to invent, But with his yron club preparing way, His mindes sad message5 backe unto him sent; The which descended with such dreadfull sway,6 That seemed nought the course thereof could stay: No more then lightening from the lofty sky. Ne list the Knight the powre thereof assay, Whose doome was death, but lightly slipping by, Unwares defrauded his intended destiny.

9

And to requite him7 with the like againe, With his sharpe sword he fiercely at him flew, And strooke so strongly, that the Carle with paine Saved him selfe, but that he there him slew: Yet sav’d not so, but that the bloud it drew, And gave his foe good hope of victory. Who therewith flesht,8 upon him set anew, And with the second stroke, thought certainely To have supplyde the first, and paide the usury.9

1

hale and draw: drag and pull. assoile: release, free. 3 light: quickly. 4 treachetours: traitors. 5 sad message: i.e., death. 6 sway: force. 7 requite him: pay him back. 8 flesht: angered, but also wounded. 2

9

supplyde: reinforced; usury: interest. Usury was a problematic concept in the early modern period, and it was often thought that good Christians should not charge interest for lending money, as Exod. 22.25 stated (“If thou lend money to my people, that is, to the poore with thee, thou shalt not be as an usurer unto him: ye shall not oppresse him with usurie”). Jews, who

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10 But Fortune aunswerd not unto his call; For as his hand was heaved up on hight, The villaine met him in the middle fall, And with his club bet backe his brondyron1 bright So forcibly, that with his owne hands might Rebeaten backe upon him selfe againe, He driven was to ground in selfe despight; From whence ere he recovery could gaine, He in his necke had set his foote with fell disdaine. 11 With that the foole, which did that end awayte, Came running in, and whilest on ground he lay, Laide heavy hands on him, and held so strayte,2 That downe he kept him with his scornefull sway,3 So as he could not weld4 him any way. The whiles that other villaine went about Him to have bound, and thrald without delay; The whiles the foole did him revile and flout,5 Threatning to yoke them two and tame their corage stout. 12 As when a sturdy ploughman with his hynde6 By strength have overthrowne a stubborne steare, They downe him hold, and fast with cords do bynde,7 Till they him force the buxome8 yoke to beare: So did these two this Knight oft tug and teare. Which when the Prince beheld, there standing by, He left his lofty steede to aide him neare, And buckling soone him selfe, gan fiercely fly Uppon that Carle, to save his friend from jeopardy. 13 The villaine leaving him unto his mate To be captiv’d, and handled as he list, Himselfe addrest unto this new debate,9 populated the ghettoes of major European cities, lent money at a rate of interest. Perhaps this reference connects Jews and Muslims (Islam was associated with Disdain in the previous canto, vii.47.9) as enemies of Christians. 1 brondyron: sword. 2 strayte: tightly. 3 sway: force.

4

weld: move. flout: mock. 6 hynde: servant. 7 As Calidore later binds the Blatant Beast (xii.34). 8 buxome: obedient; i.e., to bear the yoke obediently. 9 debate: conflict. 5

Canto Eight

113

And with his club him all about so blist,1 That he which way to turne him scarcely wist:2 Sometimes aloft he layd, sometimes alow; Now here, now there, and oft him neare he mist; So doubtfully,3 that hardly one could know Whether more wary4 were to give or ward the blow. 14 But yet the Prince so well enured5 was With such huge strokes, approved6 oft in fight, That way to them he gave forth right to pas.7 Ne would endure the daunger of their might, But wayt advantage, when they downe did light. At last the caytive after long discourse,8 When all his strokes he saw avoyded quite, Resolved in one t’assemble all his force, And make one end of him without ruth or remorse. 15 His dreadfull hand he heaved up aloft, And with his dreadfull instrument of yre,9 Thought sure have pownded him to powder soft, Or deepe emboweld in the earth entyre: But Fortune did not with his will conspire. For ere his stroke attayned his intent, The noble childe preventing10 his desire, Under his club with wary boldnesse went, And smote him on the knee, that never yet was bent.11 16 It never yet was bent, ne bent it now, Albe the stroke so strong and puissant were, That seem’d a marble pillour it could bow, But all that leg, which did his body beare, It crackt throughout, yet did no bloud appeare; So as it was unable to support

1

blist: brandished. wist: knew. 3 doubtfully: fearfully. 4 wary: certain, sure. 5 enured: accustomed. 6 approved: tested. 2

7 I.e., he allowed them to happen, clearly waiting for his moment to attack. 8 discourse: combat. 9 yre: anger, iron. 10 childe: youth; preventing: anticipating. 11 I.e., that had never known the pain of defeat and submission.

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So huge a burden on such broken geare, But fell to ground, like to a lumpe1 of durt, Whence he assayd to rise, but could not for his hurt. 17 Eftsoones the Prince to him full nimbly stept, And least he should recover foote againe, His head meant from his shoulders to have swept. Which when the Lady saw, she cryde amaine;2 “Stay stay, Sir Knight, for love of God abstaine, For that unwares ye weetlesse doe intend;3 Slay not that Carle, though worthy to be slaine: For more on him doth then him selfe depend; My life will by his death have lamentable end.” 18 He staide his hand according her desire, Yet nathemore him suffred to arize; But still suppressing4 gan of her inquire, “What meaning mote those uncouth5 words comprize, That in that villaines health her safety lies: That, were no might in man, nor heart in Knights, Which durst her dreaded reskue enterprize,6 Yet heavens them selves, that favour feeble rights, Would for it selfe redresse, and punish such despights.” 19 Then bursting forth in teares, which gushed fast Like many water streames, a while she stayd; Till the sharpe passion being overpast, Her tongue to her restord, then thus she sayd; “Nor heavens, nor men can me most wretched mayd Deliver from the doome of my desart,7 The which the God of love hath on me layd, And damned to endure this direfull smart,8 For penaunce of my proud and hard rebellious hart.

1 lumpe: reminding readers that matter is heavy and inert, without spirit. 2 amaine: with force. 3 I.e., for you don’t know what you are doing. 4 suppressing: pressing down.

5

uncouth: rude, insulting. dreaded reskue enterprize: risk her dangerous rescue. 7 doome: judgment; desart: deserving. 8 direfull smart: dreadful pain. 6

Canto Eight

115

20 “In prime of youthly yeares, when first the flowre Of beauty gan to bud, and bloosme delight, And nature me endu’d with plenteous dowre,1 Of all her gifts, that pleasde each living sight, I was belov’d of many a gentle Knight, And sude2 and sought with all the service dew: Full many a one for me deepe groand and sight,3 And to the dore of death for sorrow drew, Complayning out on me, that would not on them rew.4 21 “But let them love that list, or live or die; Me list not die for any lovers doole:5 Ne list me leave my loved libertie, To pitty him that list to play the foole: To love my selfe I learned had in schoole. Thus I triumphed long in lovers paine, And sitting carelesse on the scorners stoole,6 Did laugh at those that did lament and plaine: But all is now repayd with interest againe. 22 “For loe the winged God, that woundeth harts, Causde me be called to accompt7 therefore, And for revengement of those wrongfull smarts, Which I to others did inflict afore, Addeem’d me to endure this penaunce sore; That in this wize, and this unmeete8 array, With these two lewd companions, and no more, Disdaine and Scorne, I through the world should stray, Till I have sav’d so many, as I earst did slay.” 23 “Certes” (sayd then the Prince) “the God is just, That taketh vengeaunce of his peoples spoile. For were no law in love, but all that lust,9 Might them oppresse, and painefully turmoile, 1

dowre: dowry. sude: attended. 3 sight: sighed. 4 out on: against; rew: pity. 5 doole: grief. 2

6

scorners stoole: proverbial; a place where carping critics sat (inevitably followed by humiliation). 7 accompt: account. 8 unmeete: unseemly. 9 lust: choose, with an implied sexual meaning.

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His kingdome would continue but a while. But tell me Lady, wherefore doe you beare This bottle thus before you with such toile, And eeke this wallet at your backe arreare,1 That for these Carles to carry much more comely were?” 24 “Here in this bottle” (sayd the sory Mayd) “I put the teares of my contrition, Till to the brim I have it full defrayd:2 And in this bag which I behinde me don, I put repentaunce for things past and gon. Yet is the bottle leake, and bag so torne, That all which I put in, fals out anon; And is behinde me trodden downe of Scorne, Who mocketh all my paine, and laughs the more I mourn.” 25 The Infant3 hearkned wisely to her tale, And wondred much at Cupids judg’ment wise, That could so meekly make proud hearts avale,4 And wreake him selfe on them, that him despise. Then suffred5 he Disdaine up to arise, Who was not able up him selfe to reare, By meanes his leg through his late luckelesse prise,6 Was crackt in twaine, but by his foolish feare7 Was holpen up, who him supported standing neare. 26 But being up, he lookt againe aloft, As if he never had received fall; And with sterne eye-browes stared at him oft, As if he would have daunted him with all: And standing on his tiptoes, to seeme tall, Downe on his golden feete he often gazed, As if such pride the other could apall;8 Who was so far from being ought amazed, That he his lookes despised, and his boast dispraized.

1

4

2

5

arreare: behind. defrayd: repaid; i.e., when the bottle is full, I will have paid for my crimes. 3 Infant: noble youth. Spenser reminds us that we are seeing the young Arthur.

avale: yield. suffred: allowed. 6 prise: contest. 7 feare: companion. 8 apall: intimidate.

Canto Eight

117

27 Then turning backe unto that captive thrall, Who all this while stood there beside them bound, Unwilling to be knowne, or seene at all, He from those bands weend1 him to have unwound. But when approching neare, he plainely found, It was his owne true groome, the gentle Squire, He thereat wext exceedingly astound,2 And him did oft embrace, and oft admire, Ne could with seeing satisfie his great desire. 28 Meane while the Salvage man, when he beheld That huge great foole oppressing th’other Knight, Whom with his weight unweldy downe he held, He flew upon him, like a greedy kight3 Unto some carrion offered to his sight,4 And downe him plucking, with his nayles and teeth Gan him to hale, and teare, and scratch, and bite; And from him taking his owne whip, therewith So sore him scourgeth, that the bloud downe followeth. 29 And sure I weene, had not the Ladies cry Procur’d5 the Prince his cruell hand to stay, He would with whipping, him have done to dye: But being checkt, he did abstaine streight way, And let him rise. Then thus the Prince gan say; “Now Lady sith your fortunes thus dispose, That if ye list have liberty, ye may, Unto your selfe I freely leave to chose, Whether I shall you leave, or from these villaines lose.”6 30 “Ah nay Sir Knight” (sayd she) “it may not be, But that I needes must by all meanes fulfill This penaunce, which enjoyned is to me, Least unto me betide a greater ill; Yet no lesse thankes to you for your good will.”

1

weend: supposed. astound: astonished. 3 kight: kite; once the most common bird of prey in Britain, seen circling over every town. 2

4

Another simile that involves ferocious animals. 5 Procur’d: persuaded. Mirabella persuades Arthur to stop the Salvage Man. 6 lose: loose, free.

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So humbly taking leave, she turnd aside, But Arthure with the rest, went onward still On his first quest, in which did him betide A great adventure, which did him from them devide.1 31 But first it falleth me by course to tell Of faire Serena, who as earst you heard, When first the gentle Squire at variaunce fell With those two Carles, fled fast away, afeard Of villany to be to her inferd:2 So fresh the image of her former dread, Yet dwelling in her eye, to her appeard, That every foote did tremble, which did tread, And every body two, and two she foure did read.3 32 Through hils and dales, through bushes and through breres Long thus she fled, till that at last she thought Her selfe now past the perill of her feares. Then looking round about, and seeing nought, Which doubt of daunger to her offer mought,4 She from her palfrey lighted on the plaine, And sitting downe, her selfe a while bethought Of her long travell and turmoyling paine; And often did of love, and oft of lucke complaine. 33 And evermore she blamed Calepine, The good Sir Calepine, her owne true Knight, As th’onely author of her wofull tine:5 For being of his love to her so light, As her to leave in such a piteous plight. Yet never Turtle truer to his make,6 Then he was tride7 unto his Lady bright: Who all this while endured for her sake, Great perill of his life, and restlesse paines did take. 1

Arthur, taken up with his quest for the Fairie Queen, now disappears from the narrative of the poem. 2 inferd: inflicted. 3 read: imagine; i.e., she is so spooked that every single body appears to be two bodies, and every two to be four.

4

doubt: fear; mought: might. tine: pain, sorrow. 6 make: mate. 7 tride: his faith tested and proved. 5

Canto Eight

119

34 Tho when as all her plaints, she had displayd, And well disburdened her engrieved brest, Upon the grasse her selfe adowne she layd; Where being tyrde with travell, and opprest With sorrow, she betooke her selfe to rest. There whilest in Morpheus bosome safe1 she lay, Fearelesse of ought, that mote her peace molest, False Fortune did her safety betray, Unto a straunge mischaunce, that menac’d her decay.2 35 In these wylde deserts, where she now abode, There dwelt a salvage nation, which did live Of stealth and spoile, and making nightly rode3 Into their neighbours borders; ne did give Them selves to any trade, as for to drive The painefull plough, or cattell for to breed, Or by adventrous marchandize to thrive; But on the labours of poore men to feed, And serve their owne necessities with others need.4 36 Thereto they usde one most accursed order,5 To eate the flesh of men, whom they mote fynde, And straungers to devoure, which on their border Were brought by errour, or by wreckfull wynde.6 A monstrous cruelty gainst course of kynde.7 They towards evening wandring every way,8 To seeke for booty, came by fortune blynde, Whereas this Lady, like a sheepe astray,9 Now drowned in the depth of sleepe all fearelesse lay.

1 Morpheus: the god of sleep; safe: secure––meaning fast asleep, as she is not really safe in the wood. 2 decay: death. 3 stealth: theft; rode: raid. 4 The description of the Salvage Nation qualifies that of the Salvage Man (iv.14). 5 order: custom, practice. 6 wreckfull wynde: i.e., malign fortune.

7

kynde: nature. Cannibalism had always been seen by many Europeans as a characteristic of savage peoples, and interest in cannibalism had been reignited by stories of the peoples of the Americas. The Irish were often accused of cannibalism, a charge repeated in Spenser’s A View of the Present State of Ireland. 8 The wandering of the Salvage Nation reflects that of Serena. 9 This makes the Salvage Nation wolves.

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37 Soone as they spide her, Lord what gladfull glee They made amongst them selves; but when her face Like the faire yvory shining they did see, Each gan his fellow solace and embrace, For joy of such good hap by heavenly grace.1 Then gan they to devize what course to take: Whether to slay her there upon the place, Or suffer her out of her sleepe to wake, And then her eate attonce; or many meales to make. 38 The best advizement2 was of bad, to let her Sleepe out her fill, without encomberment:3 For sleepe they sayd would make her battill4 better. Then when she wakt, they all gave one consent, That since by grace of God she there was sent, Unto their God they would her sacrifize, Whose share, her guiltlesse bloud they would present, But of her dainty flesh they did devize To make a common feast, and feed with gurmandize.5 39 So round about her they them selves did place Upon the grasse, and diversely dispose, As each thought best to spend the lingring space.6 Some with their eyes the daintest morsels chose; Some praise her paps,7 some praise her lips and nose; Some whet their knives, and strip their elboes bare: The Priest him selfe a garland doth compose Of finest flowres, and with full busie care His bloudy vessels wash, and holy fire prepare.8

1

Showing that their perceptions of Serena are warped religious instincts. Compare the benign Salvage Nation at I.vi.7–19. 2 advizement: advice, plan. 3 encomberment: disturbance. 4 battill: fatten. 5 gurmandize: gluttony. 6 lingring space: lengthy time. 7 paps: breasts.

8

A disturbing stanza that describes Serena in terms of the unobtainable mistress in the Petrarchan tradition. One of the key forms of such poetry in England was the blazon, which described the poet’s lady from head to toe. In this stanza, we see Serena through the eyes of the savages but in terms of European poetic tradition. Spenser hints that what separates the savage and the civilized may not be as significant as many would like it to be.

Canto Eight

121

40 The Damzell wakes, then all attonce upstart, And round about her flocke, like many flies,1 Whooping, and hallowing on every part, As if they would have rent the brasen skies. Which when she sees with ghastly griefful eies, Her heart does quake, and deadly pallid hew Benumbes her cheekes: Then out aloud she cries, Where none is nigh to heare, that will her rew, And rends her golden locks, and snowy brests embrew.2 41 But all bootes3 not: they hands upon her lay; And first they spoile her of her jewls deare,4 And afterwards of all her rich array; The which amongst them they in peeces teare, And of the pray each one a part doth beare. Now being naked, to their sordid eyes The goodly threasures of nature appeare: Which as they view with lustfull fantasyes, Each wisheth to him selfe, and to the rest envyes.5 42 Her yvorie necke, her alablaster6 brest, Her paps, which like white silken pillowes were, For love in soft delight thereon to rest; Her tender sides her bellie white and clere, Which like an Altar did it selfe uprere, To offer sacrifice divine thereon; Her goodly thighes, whose glorie did appeare Like a triumphall Arch, and thereupon The spoiles of Princes hang’d, which were in battel won.7 43 Those daintie parts, the dearlings8 of delight, Which mote not be prophan’d of common eyes,9 Those villeins vew’d with loose lascivious sight, 1

Flies were often associated with lechery. embrew: moistens with either tears or blood. 3 bootes: matters; i.e., it makes no difference. 4 Taking a lady’s virginity was often described in terms of jewel stealing, so this prefigures their real plans. 5 envyes: begrudges. 2

6

alablaster: white marble. The description of Serena follows on from that of Mirabella. Mirabella’s face attracts men, as does Serena’s body. The book is venturing into darker and more disturbing territory. 8 dearlings: darlings. 9 Although Spenser has encouraged the reader to do exactly this. 7

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And closely tempted with their craftie spyes;1 And some of them gan mongst themselves devize, Thereof by force to take their beastly pleasure. But them the Priest rebuking, did advize To dare not to pollute so sacred threasure, Vow’d to the gods: religion held even theeves in measure.2 44 So being stayd, they her from thence directed Unto a litle grove not farre asyde, In which an altar shortly they erected, To slay her on. And now the Eventyde His brode black wings had through the heavens wyde By this dispred, that was the tyme ordayned For such a dismall deed, their guilt to hyde: Of few greene turfes an altar soone they fayned,3 And deckt it all with flowres, which they nigh hand4 obtayned. 45 Tho when as all things readie were aright, The Damzell was before the altar set, Being alreadie dead with fearefull fright. To whom the Priest with naked armes full net5 Approching nigh, and murdrous knife well whet, Gan mutter close a certaine secret charme, With other divelish ceremonies met:6 Which doen he gan aloft t’advance his arme, Whereat they shouted all, and made a loud alarme. 46 Then gan the bagpypes7 and the hornes to shrill, And shrieke aloud, that with the peoples voyce Confused, did the ayre with terror fill, And made the wood to tremble at the noyce: The whyles she wayld, the more they did rejoyce. Now mote ye understand that to this grove

1

closely: secretly; tempted: tested; spyes: looks. 2 measure: check. 3 fayned: made. 4 nigh hand: nearby.

5 6

net: clean.

met: suitable, fitting. bagpypes: bagpipes, often associated with the Irish and other northern European peoples. 7

Canto Eight

123

Sir Calepine by chaunce, more then by choyce, The selfe same evening fortune hether drove, As he to seeke Serena through the woods did rove. 47 Long had he sought her, and through many a soyle Had traveld still on foot in heavie armes, Ne ought was tyred with his endlesse toyles, Ne ought was feared of his certaine harmes: And now all weetlesse of the wretched stormes, In which his love was lost, he slept full fast,1 Till being waked with these loud alarmes, He lightly started up like one aghast, And catching up his arms streight to the noise forth past. 48 There by th’uncertaine glims2 of starry night, And by the twinkling of their sacred fire, He mote perceive a litle dawning sight Of all, which there was doing in that quire:3 Mongst whom a woman spoyld of all attire He spyde, lamenting her unluckie strife, And groning sore from grieved hart entire; Eftsoones he saw one with a naked knife Readie to launch4 her brest, and let out loved life. 49 With that he thrusts into the thickest throng, And even as his right hand adowne descends, He him preventing, layes on earth along, And sacrifizeth to th’infernall feends.5 Then to the rest his wrathfull hand he bends, Of whom he makes such havocke and such hew,6 That swarmes of damned soules to hell he sends: The rest that scape his sword and death eschew,7 Fly like a flocke of doves before a Faulcons vew.8 1 Calepine sleeps like Serena but suffers no consequences. 2 glims: gleams. 3 quire: chorus. 4 launch: pierce. 5 The sacrifice is reversed and the priest killed.

6

hew: slaughter. eschew: evade, escape. 8 The hunters are now the hunted—which is exactly what happened to the fierce peoples in the New World and elsewhere. 7

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50 From them returning to that Ladie backe, Whom by the Altar he doth sitting find, Yet fearing death, and next to death the lacke Of clothes to cover, what they ought by kind,1 He first her hands beginneth to unbind; And then to question of her present woe; And afterwards to cheare with speaches kind. But she for nought that he could say or doe, One word durst speake, or answere him awhit thereto.2 51 So inward shame of her uncomely case3 She did conceive, through care of womanhood, That though the night did cover her disgrace,4 Yet she in so unwomanly a mood, Would not bewray5 the state in which she stood. So all that night to him unknowen she past. But day, that doth discover bad and good, Ensewing, made her knowen6 to him at last: The end whereof Ile keepe untill another cast.7

1

kind: nature; i.e., clothes by nature ought to cover nakedness; a sly comment on the nature/culture divide. 2 Perhaps making her like the speechless Salvage Man (iv.11). 3 case: situation, covering. 4 disgrace: shaming; it is up to the reader

to decide whether the shame is Serena’s or the result of what has been done to Serena. 5 bewray: reveal. 6 knowen: she revealed her situation and told her story, but with a further sexual possibility. 7 cast: occasion.

Canto Nine Calidore hostes1 with Meliboe and loves fayre Pastorell; Coridon envies him, yet he for ill rewards him well.

1

Now turne againe my teme2 thou jolly swayne,

Backe to the furrow which I lately left;3 I lately left a furrow, one or twayne Unplough’d, the which my coulter4 hath not cleft: Yet seem’d the soyle both fayre and frutefull eft,5 As I it past, that were too great a shame, That so rich frute should be from us bereft;6 Besides the great dishonour and defame, Which should befall to Calidores immortall name. 2

Great travell hath the gentle Calidore And toyle endured, sith I left him last Sewing7 the Blatant beast, which I forbore To finish then, for other present hast. Full many pathes and perils he hath past, Through hils, through dales, throgh forests, and throgh plaines In that same quest which fortune on him cast, Which he atchieved to his owne great gaines, Reaping eternall glorie of his restlesse paines.

3

So sharply he the Monster did pursew, That day nor night he suffred him to rest, Ne rested he himselfe but natures dew,8 For dread of daunger, not to be redrest,9

1

hostes: stays.

5

2 teme: team (of

6

oxen). The “jolly swayne” appears to have become Spenser’s muse. 3 Spenser connects the pastoral muse to rural life, alerting the reader as to what lies ahead in this canto. 4 coulter: blade for ploughing.

eft: also. bereft: taken. 7 Sewing: chasing. 8 natures dew: what was due to nature; i.e., the bare minimum. 9 redrest: helped, avoided.

125

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If he for slouth forslackt1 so famous quest. Him first from court he to the citties coursed,2 And from the citties to the townes him prest, And from the townes into the countrie forsed, And from the country back to private farmes he scorsed.3 4

From thence into the open fields he fled, Whereas the Heardes were keeping of their neat,4 And shepheards singing to their flockes, that fed, Layes of sweete love and youthes delightfull heat: Him thether eke for all his fearefull threat5 He followed fast, and chaced him so nie, That to the folds, where sheepe at night doe seat,6 And to the litle cots,7 where shepherds lie In winters wrathfull time, he forced him to flie.

5

There on a day as he pursew’d the chace, He chaunst to spy a sort of shepheard groomes,8 Playing on pypes, and caroling9 apace, The whyles their beasts there in the budded broomes10 Beside them fed, and nipt the tender bloomes: For other worldly wealth they cared nought. To whom Sir Calidore yet sweating comes, And them to tell him courteously besought, If such a beast they saw, which he had thether brought.11

6

They answer’d him, that no such beast they saw, Nor any wicked feend, that mote offend12 Their happie flockes, nor daunger to them draw: But if that such there were (as none they kend)

1

forslackt: neglected. coursed: chased. 3 scorsed: turned. 4 Heardes: herdsmen; neat: cattle. 5 fearefull threat: anxiety about the quest. 6 seat: lie down. 7 cots: shelters. 2

8

sort: group, company; groomes: young. caroling: singing carols (lively songs, not religious songs for Christmas). 10 broomes: bushes. 11 thether brought: brought with him. The irony is that it is perhaps Calidore who brings the Beast into the pastoral world. 12 offend: attack. 9

Canto Nine

127

They prayd high God them farre from them to send.1 Then one of them him seeing so to sweat, After his rusticke wise, that well he weend, Offred him drinke, to quench his thirstie heat, And if he hungry were, him offred eke to eat.2 7

The knight was nothing nice,3 where was no need, And tooke their gentle offer: so adowne They prayd him sit, and gave him for to feed Such homely what, as serves the simple clowne,4 That doth despise the dainties of the towne. Tho having fed his fill, he there besyde Saw a faire damzell, which did weare a crowne Of sundry flowres, with silken ribbands tyde, Yclad in home-made greene that her owne hands had dyde.

8

Upon a litle hillocke she was placed Higher then all the rest, and round about Environ’d with a girland, goodly graced, Of lovely lasses, and them all without The lustie shepheard swaynes sate in a rout,5 The which did pype and sing her prayses dew, And oft rejoyce, and oft for wonder shout, As if some miracle of heavenly hew6 Were downe to them descended in that earthly vew.

9

And soothly sure she was full fayre of face, And perfectly well shapt in every lim, Which she did more augment with modest grace, And comely carriage of her count’nance trim,7 That all the rest like lesser lamps did dim: Who her admiring as some heavenly wight,

1

The priorities of the rural community are clear enough. Calidore should think very differently, as it is his duty to capture the Blatant Beast and so protect the shepherds. 2 The shepherd, although described here as simple, is behaving courteously, the virtue flourishing if the shepherds can thrive in safety.

3

nothing nice: not fastidious, disdainful. what: thing; clowne: simple, rustic man. 5 rout: group. 6 hew: form. 7 count’nance trim: pleasing features. 4

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Did for their soveraine goddesse her esteeme, And caroling her name both day and night, The fayrest Pastorella her by name did hight.1 10 Ne was there heard, ne was there shepheards swayne But her did honour, and eke many a one Burnt in her love, and with sweet pleasing payne Full many a night for her did sigh and grone: But most of all the shepheard Coridon2 For her did languish, and his deare life spend; Yet neither she for him, nor other none Did care a whit, ne any liking lend: Though meane her lot, yet higher did her mind ascend. 11 Her whyles Sir Calidore there vewed well, And markt her rare demeanure, which him seemed So farre the meane3 of shepheards to excell, As that he in his mind her worthy deemed, To be a Princes Paragone4 esteemed, He was unwares surprisd in subtile5 bands Of the blynd boy,6 ne thence could be redeemed By any skill out of his cruell hands, Caught like the bird, which gazing still on others stands. 12 So stood he still long gazing thereupon, Ne any will had thence to move away, Although his quest were farre afore him gon;7 But after he had fed, yet did he stay, And sate there still, untill the flying day Was farre forth spent, discoursing diversly Of sundry things, as fell to worke delay; And evermore his speach he did apply8 To th’heards, but meant them to the damzels fantazy.9 1

Pastorella: a beautiful shepherdess; hight: called.

6

2

7

Coridon: a traditional name for a shepherd. 3 meane: norm, with a pun on “mean” as lowly, humble. 4 Paragone: consort, wife. 5 subtile: thin, fine, devious.

blynd boy: Cupid. Calidore has fallen in love.

Having been absent for most of the narrative in Book Six, Calidore immediately abandons his quest. 8 apply: address. 9 fantazy: attention.

Canto Nine

129

13 By this the moystie night approching fast, Her deawy humour1 gan on th’earth to shed, That warn’d the shepheards to their homes to hast Their tender flocks, now being fully fed, For feare of wetting them before their bed; Then came to them a good old aged syre, Whose silver lockes bedeckt his beard and hed, With shepheards hooke in hand, and fit attyre, That wild2 the damzell rise; the day did now expyre. 14 He was to weet by common voice esteemed The father of the fayrest Pastorell,3 And of her selfe in very deede so deemed; Yet was not so, but as old stories4 tell Found her by fortune, which to him befell, In th’open fields an Infant left alone, And taking up brought home, and noursed well As his owne chyld; for other he had none, That she in tract5 of time accompted was his owne. 15 She at his bidding meekely did arise, And streight unto her litle flocke did fare: Then all the rest about her rose likewise, And each his sundrie sheepe with severall6 care Gathered together, and them homeward bare: Whylest everie one with helping hands did strive Amongst themselves, and did their labours share, To helpe faire Pastorella, home to drive Her fleecie flocke; but Coridon most helpe did give. 16 But Meliboe7 (so hight that good old man) Now seeing Calidore left all alone, And night arrived hard at hand, began 1

humour: moisture. wild: desired, asked. 3 The lines hint that family groups may be more casually defined than in aristocratic society. 4 old stories: romances. 5 tract: course. 6 severall: individual. 2

7 Meliboe: like Coridon, a traditional name in pastoral literature, which derives from the Greek, meaning “honey drinker.” The etymology is made clear in Chaucer’s Tale of Melibee, which follows on from the aborted Tale of Sir Thopas in The Canterbury Tales. Sir Thopas forms the basis of much of Book Four of The Faerie Queene.

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Him to invite unto his simple home; Which though it were a cottage clad with lome,1 And all things therein meane, yet better so To lodge, then in the salvage fields to rome.2 The knight full gladly soone agreed thereto, Being his harts owne wish, and home with him did go. 17 There he was welcom’d of that honest syre, And of his aged Beldame homely3 well; Who him besought himselfe to disattyre,4 And rest himselfe, till supper time befell. By which home came the fayrest Pastorell, After her flocke she in their fold had tyde, And supper readie dight,5 they to it fell With small adoe, and nature satisfyde, The which doth litle crave contented to abyde. 18 Tho when they had their hunger slaked well, And the fayre mayd the table6 ta’ne away, The gentle knight, as he that did excell In courtesie, and well could doe and say, For so great kindnesse as he found that day, Gan greatly thanke his host and his good wife; And drawing thence his speach another way, Gan highly to commend the happie life, Which Shepheards lead, without debate or bitter strife. 19 “How much” (sayd he) “more happie is the state, In which ye father here doe dwell at ease, Leading a life so free and fortunate, From all the tempests of these worldly seas, Which tosse the rest in daungerous disease? Where warres, and wreckes, and wicked enmitie

1

lome: clay. As do the Salvage Man and Salvage Nation. 3 homely: kindly. Again, we witness generous courtesy, which most of the aristocrats in the poem fail to show. 2

4 disattyre: undress, disarm. Here it should be proper and safe for a knight to disarm, but only if a knight such as Calidore is protecting the rural community. 5 dight: prepared. 6 I.e., what was on the table, food.

Canto Nine

131

Doe them afflict, which no man can appease, That certes I your happinesse envie, And wish my lot were plast in such felicitie.”1 20 “Surely my sonne” (then answer’d he againe)2 “If happie, then it is in this intent,3 That having small, yet doe I not complaine Of want, ne wish for more it to augment, But doe my self, with that I have, content; So taught of nature, which doth litle need Of forreine helpes to lifes due nourishment: The fields my food, my flocke my rayment breed; No better doe I weare, no better doe I feed. 21 “Therefore I doe not any one envy, Nor am envyde of any one therefore; They that have much, feare much to loose thereby, And store of cares doth follow riches store. The litle that I have, growes dayly more Without my care, but onely to attend it; My lambes doe every yeare increase their score, And my flockes father4 daily doth amend it. What have I, but to praise th’Almighty, that doth send it? 22 “To them, that list, the worlds gay showes I leave, And to great ones such follies doe forgive,5 Which oft through pride do their owne perill weave, And through ambition downe themselves doe drive To sad decay, that might contented live. Me no such cares nor combrous6 thoughts offend, Ne once my minds unmoved quiet grieve, But all the night in silver sleepe7 I spend, And all the day, to what I list, I doe attend.

1

The shepherds’ lot only seems desirable if their lives are safe, which, as the book shows, is not the case if Calidore neglects his task. 2 againe: in return. 3 intent: sense.

4

flockes father: presumably referring to the ram, who helps increase the flock. 5 forgive: let go, accept that they are for others; but also with a sense of condemnation. 6 combrous: troublesome. 7 Cf. vii.19.8.

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23 “Sometimes I hunt the Fox, the vowed foe Unto my Lambes, and him dislodge away;1 Sometime the fawne I practise from the Doe, Or from the Goat her kidde how to convay;2 Another while I baytes3 and nets display, The birds to catch, or fishes to beguyle: And when I wearie am, I downe doe lay My limbes in every shade, to rest from toyle, And drinke of every brooke, when thirst my throte doth boyle. 24 “The time was once, in my first prime of yeares, When pride of youth forth pricked my desire, That I disdain’d amongst mine equall peares To follow sheepe, and shepheards base attire: For further fortune then I would inquire.4 And leaving home, to roiall court I sought; Where I did sell my selfe for yearely hire, And in the Princes gardin daily wrought: There I beheld such vainenesse, as I never thought.5 25 “With sight whereof soone cloyd,6 and long deluded With idle hopes, which them7 doe entertaine, After I had ten yeares my selfe excluded From native home, and spent my youth in vaine, I gan my follies to my selfe to plaine,8 And this sweet peace, whose lacke did then appeare. Tho backe returning to my sheepe againe, I from thenceforth have learn’d to love more deare This lowly quiet life, which I inherite here.”

1

Already Meliboe shows that danger stalks the pastoral world. A common feature of Protestant satire was to represent good Christians as sheep protected by their pastors (shepherds) against the threat of Catholic wolves. 2 Meliboe’s hunting practices are not without their brutality and violence. 3 baytes: traps.

4

inquire: seek. Such anti-court satire is common in many of Spenser’s works, e.g., The Shepheardes Calender and Mother Hubberds Tale. 6 cloyd: became unpleasant, less attractive. 7 them: the courtiers. 8 plaine: regret, deplore. 5

Canto Nine

133

26 Whylest thus he talkt, the knight with greedy eare Hong still upon his melting mouth attent;1 Whose sensefull words empierst his hart so neare,2 That he was rapt with double ravishment, Both of his speach that wrought him great content, And also of the object of his vew,3 On which his hungry eye was alwayes bent; That twixt his pleasing tongue, and her faire hew, He lost himselfe, and like one halfe entraunced grew.4 27 Yet to occasion meanes, to worke his mind, And to insinuate his harts desire,5 He thus replyde; “Now surely syre, I find, That all this worlds gay showes, which we admire, Be but vaine shadowes to6 this safe retyre Of life, which here in lowlinesse ye lead, Fearelesse of foes, or fortunes wrackfull7 yre, Which tosseth states, and under foot doth tread The mightie ones, affrayd of every chaunges dread.8 28 “That even I which daily doe behold The glorie of the great, mongst whom I won,9 And now have prov’d, what happinesse ye hold In this small plot of your dominion, Now loath great Lordship and ambition; And wish th’heavens so much had graced mee, As graunt me live in like condition; Or that my fortunes might transposed bee From pitch of higher place, unto this low degree.”

1 The image alludes to Meliboe’s name as “honey mouth,” a speaker of sweet words. It also suggests that Calidore has lost all reason in his passion for Meliboe’s words, just as his own speech can “steale mens hearts away” (i.2.6). 2 sensefull: sensual, rather than sensible. The image of the pierced heart perhaps suggests the death of Calidore’s reason. 3 I.e., Pastorella.

4

Compare the vision of the Graces in the next canto (x.17.4). 5 I.e., to bring about what he most desires (Pastorella). 6 to: compared with. 7 wrackfull: destructive. 8 chaunges dread: the fury of change. 9 won: lived.

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29 “In vaine” (said then old Meliboe) “doe men The heavens of their fortunes fault accuse, Sith they know best, what is the best for them: For they to each such fortune doe diffuse, As they doe know each can most aptly use. For not that, which men covet most, is best, Nor that thing worst, which men do most refuse; But fittest is, that all contented rest With that they hold: each hath his fortune in his brest.1 30 “It is the mynd, that maketh good or ill, That maketh wretch or happie, rich or poore: For some, that hath abundance at his will, Hath not enough, but wants in greatest store; And other, that hath litle, askes no more, But in that litle is both rich and wise. For wisedome is most riches; fooles therefore They are, which fortunes doe by vowes devize,2 Sith each unto himselfe his life may fortunize.”3 31 “Since then in each mans self” (said Calidore) “It is, to fashion his owne lyfes estate,4 Give leave awhyle, good father, in this shore To rest my barcke,5 which hath bene beaten late With stormes of fortune and tempestuous fate, In seas of troubles and of toylesome paine, That whether quite from them for to retrate I shall resolve, or backe to turne againe, I may here with your selfe some small repose obtaine.

1

Meliboe’s words clearly indicate that Calidore should continue as knight rather than seek to be a shepherd. However, Calidore’s mind is so ravished that he cannot hear this message, which leads to the destruction of the shepherds’ world he craves. See Introduction, “Pastoral.” 2 vowes devize: scheme to obtain their will.

3

fortunize: control fortune. Meliboe’s words are a major statement, given the themes of the book and the fact that most of the characters either are or feel themselves to be subject to the whims of fortune. 4 Calidore either misunderstands Meliboe or adapts his words for his own purposes. 5 barcke: boat.

Canto Nine

135

32 “Not that the burden of so bold a guest Shall chargefull1 be, or chaunge to you at all; For your meane food shall be my daily feast, And this your cabin both my bowre and hall. Besides for recompence hereof, I shall You well reward, and golden guerdon2 give, That may perhaps you better much withall, And in this quiet make you safer live.”3 So forth he drew much gold, and toward him it drive.4 33 But the good man, nought tempted with the offer Of his rich mould,5 did thrust it farre away, And thus bespake; “Sir knight, your bounteous proffer6 Be farre fro me, to whom ye ill display That mucky masse, the cause of mens decay, That mote empaire my peace with daungers dread. But if ye algates7 covet to assay This simple sort of life, that shepheards lead, Be it your owne: our rudenesse to your selfe aread.”8 34 So there that night Sir Calidore did dwell, And long while after, whilest him list remaine, Dayly beholding the faire Pastorell, And feeding on the bayt9 of his owne bane. During which time he did her entertaine With all kind courtesies, he could invent;10 And every day, her companie to gaine, When to the field she went, he with her went: So for to quench his fire, he did it more augment. 35 But she that never had acquainted beene With such queint usage,11 fit for Queenes and Kings, Ne ever had such knightly service seene,

1

chargefull: heavy, burdensome. guerdon: reward. 3 The opposite proves to be the case, and the lives of the shepherds become more dangerous. 4 drive: gave, held out. 5 mould: form, dross. 2

6

proffer: offer. algates: nevertheless. 8 aread: teach. 9 bayt: bait, enticement. 10 invent: think of; also suggests an artificiality in his behavior. 11 queint usage: unusual treatment. 7

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But being bred under base shepheards wings, Had ever learn’d to love the lowly things, Did litle whit regard his courteous guize,1 But cared more for Colins carolings2 Then all that he could doe, or ever devize: His layes, his loves, his lookes she did them all despize. 36 Which Calidore perceiving, thought it best To chaunge the manner of his loftie looke; And doffing his bright armes, himselfe addrest3 In shepheards weed, and in his hand he tooke, In stead of steelehead speare, a shepheards hooke, That who had seene him then, would have bethought On Phrygian Paris by Plexippus brooke, When he the love of fayre Oenone sought, What time the golden apple was unto him brought.4 37 So being clad, unto the fields he went With the faire Pastorella every day, And kept her sheepe with diligent attent,5 Watching to drive the ravenous Wolfe away, The whylest at pleasure she mote sport and play; And every evening helping them to fold: And otherwhiles for need, he did assay In his strong hand their rugged teats to hold, And out of them to presse the milke: love so much could. 38 Which seeing Coridon, who her likewise Long time had lov’d, and hop’d her love to gaine, He much was troubled at that straungers guize, 1

guize: appearance. A Spenserian joke. Colin Clout is the poet’s own alter ego. Colin is usually depicted as unlucky in love, but here he is ahead of the courtier without even trying. 2

3

addrest: dressed. Paris fell in love with and married Oenone, retreating from court into the country. While he was there, he was asked to judge who of the three goddesses, Aphrodite, Hera, and Athene, was the fairest and so deserved the golden apple. 4

Paris awarded it to Aphrodite, who later protected him––with disastrous consequences. Paris eventually caused the destruction of Troy through his elopement with Helen, a story that appears at many points in The Faerie Queene, most notably at III.ix–x. Calidore is compared to Paris partly because Calidore steals Coridon’s love as Paris stole Menelaus’, but the more important suggestion is that his behavior may have disastrous effects. 5 attent: care, attention.

Canto Nine

137

And many gealous thoughts conceiv’d in vaine, That this of all his labour and long paine Should reap the harvest, ere it ripened were, That made him scoule, and pout, and oft complaine Of Pastorell to all the shepheards there, That she did love a stranger swayne then him more dere.1 39 And ever when him came in companie, Where Calidore was present, he would loure, And byte his lip, and even for gealousie Was readie oft his owne hart to devoure, Impatient of any paramoure:2 Who on the other side did seeme so farre From malicing, or grudging his good houre,3 That all he could, he graced him with her, Ne ever shewed signe of rancour or of jarre.4 40 And oft, when Coridon unto her brought Or litle sparrowes, stolen from their nest, Or wanton squirrels,5 in the woods farre sought, Or other daintie thing for her addrest,6 He would commend his guift, and make the best. Yet she no whit his presents did regard, Ne him could find to fancie in her brest: This newcome shepheard had his market mard. Old love is litle worth when new is more prefard. 41 One day when as the shepheard swaynes together Were met, to make their sports and merrie glee, As they are wont in faire sunshynie weather, The whiles their flockes in shadowes shrouded bee, They fell to daunce: then did they all agree, That Colin clout7 should pipe as one most fit;

1 Calidore introduces disharmony into the shepherds’ world. 2 paramoure: rival lover. 3 malicing: regarding with malice; houre: luck, fortune. 4 jarre: discord.

5

The animals are probably intended to suggest sexuality. 6 addrest: prepared. 7 Colin clout: a name adopted by Spenser himself, based on John Skelton’s (?1460– 1529) truth-telling character in his satirical poem of the same name.

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And Calidore should lead the ring, as hee That most in Pastorellaes grace did sit. Thereat frown’d Coridon, and his lip closely bit. 42 But Calidore of courteous inclination Tooke Coridon, and set him in his place, That he should lead the daunce, as was his fashion; For Coridon could daunce, and trimly trace.1 And when as Pastorella, him to grace, Her flowry garlond tooke from her owne head, And plast on his, he did it soone displace, And did it put on Coridons in stead: Then Coridon woxe frollicke,2 that earst seemed dead. 43 Another time, when as they did dispose To practise games, and maisteries3 to try, They for their Judge did Pastorella chose; A garland was the meed of victory. There Coridon forth stepping openly, Did chalenge Calidore to wrestling game: For he through long and perfect industry, Therein well practisd was, and in the same Thought sure t’avenge his grudge, and worke his foe great shame. 44 But Calidore he greatly did mistake; For he was strong and mightily stiffe pight,4 That with one fall his necke he almost brake, And had he not upon him fallen light, His dearest joynt5 he sure had broken quight. Then was the oaken crowne by Pastorell Given to Calidore, as his due right; But he, that did in courtesie excell, Gave it to Coridon, and said he wonne it well.6

1

trimly trace: dance neatly. frollicke: jolly.

4

2 3

maisteries: trials of strength.

6 The gesture seems courteous, but actually undermines Coridon.

5

stiffe pight: sturdily built. dearest joynt: neck.

Canto Nine

45 Thus did the gentle knight himselfe abeare Amongst that rusticke rout in all his deeds, That even they, the which his rivals were, Could not maligne him, but commend him needs: For courtesie amongst the rudest breeds Good will and favour. So it surely wrought With this faire Mayd, and in her mynde the seeds Of perfect love did sow, that last forth brought The fruite of joy and blisse, though long time dearely bought. 46 Thus Calidore continu’d there long time, To winne the love of the faire Pastorell; Which having got, he used without crime Or blamefull blot, but menaged so well, That he of all the rest, which there did dwell, Was favoured, and to her grace commended. But what straunge fortunes unto him befell, Ere he attain’d the point by him intended, Shall more conveniently in other place be ended.

139

Canto Ten Calidore sees the Graces daunce, To Colins melody: The whiles his Pastorell is led, Into captivity.

1

Who now does follow the foule Blatant Beast, Whilest Calidore does follow that faire Mayd, Unmyndfull of his vow and high beheast, Which by the Faery Queene was on him layd, That he should never leave, nor be delayd From chacing him, till he had it attchieved? But now entrapt of love, which him betrayd, He mindeth more, how he may be relieved With grace from her, whose love his heart hath sore engrieved.

2

That from henceforth he meanes no more to sew1 His former quest, so full of toile and paine; Another quest, another game in vew He hath, the guerdon2 of his love to gaine: With whom he myndes3 for ever to remaine, And set his rest amongst the rusticke sort, Rather then hunt still after shadowes vaine Of courtly favour, fed with light report, Of every blaste, and sayling alwaies on the port.4

3

Ne certes mote he greatly blamed be, From so high step to stoupe5 unto so low. For who had tasted once (as oft did he) The happy peace, which there doth overflow, And prov’d6 the perfect pleasures, which doe grow

1

sew: pursue. guerdon: reward. 3 myndes: plans, intends. 4 on the port: toward port (without ever arriving). The opening stanza appears to 2

blame Calidore for his neglect of his quest; the second provides the reasons why he may have done so. 5 stoupe: stoop; also means a falcon swooping on its prey. 6

140

prov’d: experienced.

Canto Ten

141

Amongst poore hyndes,1 in hils, in woods, in dales, Would never more delight in painted show Of such false blisse, as there is set for stales,2 T’entrap unwary fooles in their eternall bales.3 4

For what hath all that goodly glorious gaze Like to one sight, which Calidore did vew? The glaunce whereof their dimmed eies would daze, That never more they should endure the shew Of that sunne-shine, that makes them looke askew.4 Ne ought in all that world of beauties rare, (Save onely Glorianaes heavenly hew To which what can compare?)5 can it compare; The which as commeth now, by course I will declare.

5

One day as he did raunge the fields abroad, Whilest his faire Pastorella was elsewhere, He chaunst to come, far from all peoples troad,6 Unto a place, whose pleasaunce did appere To passe all others, on the earth which were: For all that ever was by natures skill Devized to worke delight, was gathered there, And there by her were poured forth at fill,7 As if this to adorne, she all the rest did pill.8

6

It was an hill plaste in an open plaine, That round about was bordered with a wood Of matchlesse hight, that seem’d th’earth to disdaine, In which all trees of honour stately stood, And did all winter as in sommer bud,

1

hyndes: rural laborers, but with a further reference to deer, who are hunted by the wealthy.

2

stales: snares, traps. bales: griefs, sorrows. 4 askew: away. 5 The comparison between Gloriana and a shepherdess is ostensibly refused here, only to be made more explicit in stanza 28. 3

6

troad: tread.

7

at fill: fully. pill: steal from, pillage. Such a beautiful place, a locus amoenus, is often the site of appalling violence––especially in the work of Latin poets, such as Ovid, who had a great influence on Spenser. Earlier depictions of such retreats in the poem, most notably the Bower of Bliss (II.xii.50–63), generally contain clear hints of danger and moral corruption. The last line here also prefigures the fate of the shepherds in this canto.

8

142

The Faerie Queene: Book Six

Spredding pavilions for the birds to bowre,1 Which in their lower braunches sung aloud; And in their tops the soring hauke did towre,2 Sitting like King of fowles in majesty and powre.3 7

And at the foote thereof, a gentle flud4 His silver waves did softly tumble downe, Unmard with ragged mosse or filthy mud, Ne mote wylde beastes, ne mote the ruder clowne Thereto approch, ne filth mote therein drowne:5 But Nymphes and Faeries by the bancks did sit, In the woods shade, which did the waters crowne, Keeping all noysome6 things away from it, And to the waters fall7 tuning their accents fit.

8

And on the top thereof a spacious plaine Did spred it selfe, to serve to all delight, Either to daunce, when they to daunce would faine,8 Or else to course about their bases light;9 Ne ought there wanted, which for pleasure might Desired be, or thence to banish bale:10 So pleasauntly the hill with equall11 hight, Did seeme to overlooke the lowly vale; Therefore it rightly cleeped was mount Acidale.12

9

They say that Venus, when she did dispose13 Her selfe to pleasaunce, used to resort Unto this place, and therein to repose And rest her selfe, as in a gladsome port, Or with the Graces there to play and sport;

1

bowre: nest. towre: perch. 3 A reminder that nature is not as different from culture as it may at first appear. Hawks eat other birds. 4 flud: stream. 5 drowne: sink. 6 noysome: unpleasant, annoying. 7 waters fall: waterfall. 8 faine: desire. 2

9

light: quickly. An allusion to the game of prisoners’ base, in which one side chases the other before roles are exchanged. 10 bale: grief, misery. 11 equall: level. 12 cleeped: called; Acidale: connected to Venus. The description looks back to the Mount of Venus in the Garden of Adonis (II.vi.43–5). 13 dispose: prepare, plan.

Canto Ten

That even her owne Cytheron,1 though in it She used most to keepe her royall court, And in her soveraine Majesty to sit, She in regard hereof refusde and thought unfit. 10 Unto this place when as the Elfin Knight Approcht, him seemed that the merry sound Of a shrill pipe he playing heard on hight,2 And many feete fast thumping th’hollow ground, That through the woods their Eccho did rebound. He nigher drew, to weete3 what mote it be; There he a troupe of Ladies dauncing found Full merrily, and making gladfull glee, And in the midst a Shepheard piping he did see. 11 He durst not enter into th’open greene, For dread of them unwares to be descryde, For breaking of their daunce, if he were seene; But in the covert of the wood did byde,4 Beholding all, yet of them unespyde. There he did see, that pleased much his sight, That even he him selfe his eyes envyde, An hundred naked maidens lilly white, All raunged in a ring, and dauncing in delight. 12 All they without were raunged in a ring, And daunced round; but in the midst of them Three other Ladies did both daunce and sing, The whilest the rest them round about did hemme, And like a girlond did in compasse stemme:5 And in the middest of those same three, was placed Another Damzell, as a precious gemme, Amidst a ring most richly well enchaced, That with her goodly presence all the rest much graced.

1

Cytheron: one of Venus’ favorite haunts. The reader is referred back to III.vi.29.4, further emphasizing the link between Mount Acidale and the Garden of Adonis. 2 pipe: bagpipe; on hight: loudly.

3

weete: discover. byde: wait, hide. 5 I.e., in a circle. 4

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13 Looke how the Crowne, which Ariadne wore Upon her yvory forehead that same day, That Theseus her unto his bridale bore,1 When the bold Centaures made that bloudy fray With the fierce Lapithes, which did them dismay;2 Being now placed in the firmament,3 Through the bright heaven doth her beams display, And is unto the starres an ornament, Which round about her move in order excellent. 14 Such was the beauty of this goodly band, Whose sundry parts were here too long to tell: But she that in the midst of them did stand, Seem’d all the rest in beauty to excell, Crownd with a rosie girlond, that right well Did her beseeme. And ever, as the crew About her daunst, sweet flowres, that far did smell, And fragrant odours they uppon her threw; But most of all, those three did her with gifts endew. 15 Those were the Graces,4 daughters of delight, Handmaides of Venus, which are wont to haunt Uppon this hill, and daunce there day and night: Those three to men all gifts of grace do graunt, And all, that Venus in her selfe doth vaunt,5 Is borrowed of them. But that faire one, That in the midst was placed paravaunt,6 Was she to whom that shepheard pypt alone, That made him pipe so merrily, as never none. 16 She was to weete that jolly Shepheards lasse,7 Which piped there unto that merry rout, That jolly shepheard, which there piped, was 1

Ariadne was abandoned by Theseus. Bacchus placed her bridal crown in the sky and it became the constellation Corona Borealis. 2 The battle between the Centaurs and the Lapithes took place at the wedding of Pirithous and Hippodamia. Spenser, as elsewhere in the poem, conflates more than one myth.

3

firmament: sky. Graces: the beautiful women who are the figures of artistic and intellectual inspiration. This is one of the key set pieces in the poem. See Introduction, “The Graces.” 5 vaunt: display, show. 6 paravaunt: preeminently. 7 The central figure is a shepherdess, not a queen, who is now made another Grace. 4

Canto Ten

Poore Colin Clout (who knowes not Colin Clout?)1 He pypt apace, whilest they him daunst about. Pype jolly shepheard, pype thou now apace Unto thy love, that made thee low to lout;2 Thy love is present there with thee in place, Thy love is there advaunst to be another Grace. 17 Much wondred Calidore at this straunge sight, Whose like before his eye had never seene, And standing long astonished in spright, And rapt3 with pleasaunce, wist not what to weene; Whether it were the traine of beauties Queene, Or Nymphes, or Faeries, or enchaunted show, With which his eyes mote have deluded beene. Therefore resolving, what it was, to know, Out of the wood he rose, and toward them did go. 18 But soone as he appeared to their vew, They vanisht all away out of his sight, And cleane were gone, which way he never knew; All save the shepheard, who for fell despight Of that displeasure, broke his bag-pipe quight,4 And made great mone for that unhappy turne. But Calidore, though no lesse sory wight, For that mishap, yet seeing him to mourne, Drew neare, that he the truth of all by him mote learne. 19 And first him greeting, thus unto him spake, “Haile jolly shepheard, which thy joyous dayes Here leadest in this goodly merry make, Frequented of these gentle Nymphes alwayes, Which to thee flocke, to heare thy lovely layes;5 Tell me, what mote these dainty Damzels be,

This seems to indicate that grace and rank cannot simply be equated. 1 Probably an ironic question, which draws attention to the relative obscurity the poet feels he experiences after his early hopes of poetic glory; and a forceful reminder that he should be better known.

2

lout: stoop, in obedience. rapt: seized, consumed. 4 quight: completely. 5 layes: songs, tunes. 3

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Which here with thee doe make their pleasant playes? Right happy thou, that mayst them freely see: But why when I them saw, fled they away from me?” 20 “Not I so happy” answerd then that swaine, “As thou unhappy, which them thence didst chace, Whom by no meanes thou canst recall againe, For being gone, none can them bring in place, But whom they of them selves list so to grace.”1 “Right sory I,” (saide then Sir Calidore,) “That my ill fortune2 did them hence displace. But since things passed none may now restore, Tell me, what were they all, whose lacke thee grieves so sore.” 21 Tho gan that shepheard thus for to dilate;3 “Then wote thou shepheard, whatsoever thou bee, That all those Ladies, which thou sawest late, Are Venus Damzels, all with in her fee,4 But differing in honour and degree: They all are Graces, which on her depend, Besides a thousand more, which ready bee Her to adorne, when so she forth doth wend:5 But those three in the midst, doe chiefe on her attend. 22 “They are the daughters of sky-ruling Jove, By him begot of faire Eurynome,6 The Oceans daughter, in this pleasant grove, As he this way comming from feastfull glee, Of Thetis wedding with AEcidee,7

1

list so to grace: desire to please. Was it Fortune or Calidore’s ignorant foolishness that made the Graces disappear? There is a clear irony in the Knight of Courtesy making the Graces disappear, one that reflects badly on the court. Colin doesn’t hesitate to tell Calidore as much: it is he, the courtier, who should consider himself most unhappy. 3 dilate: discuss, at length. 4 fee: service. 5 wend: go. 2

6

Eurynome: the wife of the Titan Ophion, ruler of the universe before the two were deposed by Saturn. Saturn was then deposed by Jove, with whom Eurynome conceived the Graces as a means of reconciling the warring rulers and their factions. Yet again, most significantly in the later stages of the poem, the story of Jove is mentioned––especially his conflict with his father, Saturn, and the Titans. 7 Thetis: a sea nymph adopted by Hera; AEcidee: Peleus; the parents of Achilles.

Canto Ten

147

In sommers shade him selfe here rested weary. The first of them hight mylde Euphrosyne,1 Next faire Aglaia, last Thalia2 merry: Sweete Goddesses all three which me in mirth do cherry.3 23 “These three on men all gracious gifts bestow, Which decke the body or adorne the mynde, To make them lovely or well favoured show, As comely carriage,4 entertainement kynde, Sweete semblaunt, friendly offices that bynde,5 And all the complements of curtesie: They teach us, how to each degree and kynde We should our selves demeane, to low, to hie; To friends, to foes, which skill men call Civility. 24 “Therefore they alwaies smoothly seeme to smile, That we likewise should mylde and gentle be, And also naked are, that without guile Or false dissemblaunce all them plaine may see, Simple and true from covert malice free: And eeke them selves so in their daunce they bore, That two of them still forward seem’d to bee, But one still towards shew’d her selfe afore; That good should from us goe, then come in greater store. 25 “Such were those Goddesses, which ye did see; But that fourth Mayd, which there amidst them traced,6 Who can aread,7 what creature mote she bee, Whether a creature, or a goddesse graced With heavenly gifts from heven first enraced?8 But what so sure she was, she worthy was, To be the fourth with those three other placed: Yet was she certes but a countrey lasse, Yet she all other countrey lasses farre did passe.

1

Euphrosyne: cheerfulness. Aglaia: beauty, brightness; Thalia: the muse of comedy. 3 cherry: cheer. 4 comely carriage: gracious behavior. 2

5 semblaunt: appearance; offices that bynde: bonds of friendship. 6 traced: danced. 7 aread: tell. 8 enraced: sent, planted.

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26 “So farre as doth the daughter of the day,1 All other lesser lights in light excell, So farre doth she in beautyfull array, Above all other lasses beare the bell,2 Ne lesse in vertue that beseemes her well, Doth she exceede the rest of all her race, For which the Graces that here wont to dwell, Have for more honor brought her to this place, And graced her so much to be another Grace. 27 “Another Grace she well deserves to be, In whom so many Graces gathered are, Excelling much the meane3 of her degree; Divine resemblaunce, beauty soveraine rare, Firme Chastity, that spight4 ne blemish dare; All which she with such courtesie doth grace, That all her peres cannot with her compare, But quite are dimmed, when she is in place. She made me often pipe and now to pipe apace. 28 “Sunne of the world, great glory of the sky, That all the earth doest lighten with thy rayes, Great Gloriana, greatest Majesty, Pardon thy shepheard, mongst so many layes, As he hath sung of thee in all his dayes, To make one minime5 of thy poore handmayd, And underneath thy feete to place her prayse, That when thy glory shall be farre displayd To future age of her this mention may be made.”6 29 When thus that shepherd ended had his speach, Sayd Calidore; “Now sure it yrketh7 mee, That to thy blisse I made this luckelesse breach, As now the author of thy bale to be, Thus to bereave thy loves deare sight from thee: 1

daughter of the day: Venus. beare the bell: i.e., takes the prize. 3 meane: average, norm. 4 spight: envy, spite. 5 minime: a short musical note. 2

6

The lines seem courteous, but Spenser has just replaced the queen with a shepherdess, a move that indicates that strict hierarchies may not be an inevitable good. 7 yrketh: troubles.

Canto Ten

But gentle Shepheard pardon thou my shame, Who rashly sought that, which I mote not see.” Thus did the courteous Knight excuse his blame, And to recomfort him, all comely meanes did frame. 30 In such discourses they together spent Long time, as fit occasion forth them led; With which the Knight him selfe did much content, And with delight his greedy fancy fed, Both of his words, which he with reason red;1 And also of the place, whose pleasures rare With such regard2 his sences ravished, That thence, he had no will away to fare, But wisht, that with that shepheard he mote dwelling share.3 31 But that envenimd sting, the which of yore, His poysnous point deepe fixed in his hart Had left, now gan afresh to rancle sore, And to renue the rigour4 of his smart: Which to recure, no skill of Leaches art Mote him availe, but to returne againe To his wounds worker, that with lovely dart5 Dinting6 his brest, had bred his restlesse paine, Like as the wounded Whale to shore flies from the maine.7 32 So taking leave of that same gentle swaine, He backe returned to his rusticke wonne,8 Where his faire Pastorella did remaine: To whome in sort,9 as he at first begonne, He daily did apply him selfe to donne,10 All dewfull service voide of thoughts impure Ne any paines ne perill did he shonne, By which he might her to his love allure, And liking in her yet untamed heart procure. 1

6

2

7

red: spoke. regard: sight. 3 Once again, Calidore envies the lives of the shepherds. 4 5

rigour: force, violence. lovely dart: dart of love.

Dinting: striking. maine: ocean. 8 wonne: home, dwelling. 9 sort: manner. 10 donne: give.

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33 And evermore the shepheard Coridon, What ever thing he did her to aggrate,1 Did strive to match with strong contention, And all his paines did closely emulate; Whether it were to caroll, as they sate Keeping their sheepe, or games to exercize,2 Or to present her with their labours late; Through which if any grace chaunst to arize To him, the Shepheard streight with jealousie did frize. 34 One day as they all three together went To the greene wood, to gather strawberies, There chaunst to them a dangerous accident; A Tigre forth out of the wood did rise, That with fell clawes full of fierce gourmandize,3 And greedy mouth, wide gaping like hell gate, Did runne at Pastorell her to surprize: Whom she beholding, now all desolate Gan cry to them aloud, to helpe her all4 too late. 35 Which Coridon first hearing, ran in hast To reskue her, but when he saw the feend, Through cowherd feare he fled away as fast, Ne durst abide the daunger of the end; His life he steemed5 dearer then his frend. But Calidore soone comming to her ayde, When he the beast saw ready now to rend His loves deare spoile, in which his heart was prayde,6 He ran at him enraged in stead of being frayde. 36 He had no weapon, but his shepheards hooke, To serve the vengeaunce of his wrathfull will, With which so sternely he the monster strooke, That to the ground astonished7 he fell; Whence ere he could recov’r, he did him quell,8

1 2

aggrate: please.

exercize: practice, play. 3 gourmandize: voraciousness, greed. 4 all: i.e., before it was. 5 steemed: valued.

6

loves deare spoile: i.e., Pastorella’s body; prayde: captured. 7 astonished: stunned. 8 quell: kill.

Canto Ten

151

And hewing1 off his head, it presented Before the feete of the faire Pastorell; Who scarcely yet from former feare exempted, A thousand times him thankt, that had her death prevented. 37 From that day forth she gan him to affect,2 And daily more her favour to augment; But Coridon for cowherdize reject, Fit to keepe sheepe, unfit for loves content:3 The gentle heart scornes base disparagement.4 Yet Calidore did not despise him quight, But usde him friendly for further intent, That by his fellowship, he colour5 might Both his estate, and love from skill of any wight.6 38 So well he wood her, and so well he wrought her, With humble service, and with daily sute, That at the last unto his will he brought her; Which he so wisely well did prosecute, That of his love he reapt the timely frute, And joyed long in close felicity: Till fortune fraught with malice, blinde, and brute,7 That envies lovers long prosperity, Blew up a bitter storme of foule adversity. 39 It fortuned one day, when Calidore Was hunting in the woods (as was his trade)8 A lawlesse people, Brigants9 hight of yore, That never usde to live by plough nor spade,10

1

hewing: cutting. Using a shepherd’s crook is necessarily messier than using a knight’s sword. 2 affect: love. 3 This statement suggests that Pastorella’s values are changing and that she sees the best thing in life as the preservation of the upper social classes. 4 disparagement: disgrace, associated with being pulled down to a lower social rank. 5 colour: disguise.

6

estate: social rank; skill: knowledge. Calidore is again shown to be duplicitous under the guise of courtesy. 7 brute: brutal. 8 trade: Calidore has now assumed a new job. 9 Brigants: aggressive tribes of marauders, sometimes connected to ancient British peoples: Irish, Scots, and Picts. 10 Like the Salvage Man (iv.14.7) and the Salvage Nation (viii.35).

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But fed on spoile and booty, which they made Upon their neighbours, which did nigh them border, The dwelling of these shepheards did invade, And spoyld their houses, and them selves did murder; And drove away their flocks, with other much disorder. 40 Amongst the rest, the which they then did pray, They spoyld old Melibee of all he had, And all his people captive led away, Mongst which this lucklesse mayd away was lad, Faire Pastorella, sorrowfull and sad, Most sorrowfull, most sad, that ever sight,1 Now made the spoile of theeves and Brigants bad, Which was the conquest of the gentlest Knight, That ever liv’d, and th’onely glory of his might. 41 With them also was taken Coridon, And carried captive by those theeves away; Who in the covert of the night, that none Mote them descry, nor reskue from their pray, Unto their dwelling did them close2 convay. Their dwelling in a little Island was, Covered with shrubby woods, in which no way Appeard for people in nor out to pas, Nor any footing fynde for overgrowen gras. 42 For underneath the ground their way was made, Through hollow caves, that no man mote discover For the thicke shrubs, which did them alwaies shade From view of living wight, and covered over: But darkenesse dred and daily night did hover Through all the inner parts, wherein they dwelt. Ne lightned was with window, nor with lover,3 But with continuall candlelight, which delt A doubtfull sense of things, not so well seene, as felt.4

1

sight: sighed. close: secretly. 3 lover: opening to let light in (louvre). 2

4

See Exod. 10.21, when God curses Egypt: “that there may bee upon the lande of Egypt darknesse, even darknesse that may be felt.”

Canto Ten

153

43 Hither those Brigants brought their present pray, And kept them with continuall watch and ward, Meaning so soone, as they convenient may, For slaves to sell them, for no small reward, To merchants, which them kept in bondage hard, Or sold againe. Now when faire Pastorell Into this place was brought, and kept with gard Of griesly theeves, she thought her self in hell, Where with such damned fiends she should in darknesse dwell. 44 But for to tell the dolefull dreriment,1 And pittifull complaints, which there she made, Where day and night she nought did but lament Her wretched life, shut up in deadly shade, And waste her goodly beauty, which did fade Like to a flowre, that feeles no heate of sunne, Which may her feeble leaves with comfort glade.2 But what befell her in that theevish wonne, Will in an other Canto better be begonne.

1

dolefull dreriment: great sorrow.

2

glade: gladden, cheer.

Canto Eleven The theeves fall out for Pastorell, Whilest Melibee is slaine: Her Calidore from them redeemes, And bringeth backe againe.

1

The joyes of love, if they should ever last, Without affliction or disquietnesse, That worldly chaunces doe amongst them cast, Would be on earth too great a blessednesse, Liker to heaven, then mortall wretchednesse. Therefore the winged God, to let men weet,1 That here on earth is no sure happinesse, A thousand sowres hath tempred with one sweet, To make it seeme more deare and dainty, as is meet.2

2

Like as is now befalne to this faire Mayd, Faire Pastorell, of whom is now my song, Who being now in dreadfull darknesse layd, Amongst those theeves, which her in bondage strong Detaynd, yet Fortune not with all this wrong Contented, greater mischiefe on her threw, And sorrowes heapt on her in greater throng; That who so heares her heavinesse, would rew And pitty her sad plight, so chang’d from pleasaunt hew.3

3

Whylest thus she in these hellish dens remayned, Wrapped in wretched cares and hearts unrest, It so befell (as Fortune had ordayned) That he, which was their Capitaine profest, And had the chiefe commaund of all the rest, One day as he did all his prisoners vew,

1 2

weet: learn. dainty: precious; meet: fitting.

3

154

hew: form, appearance.

Canto Eleven

155

With lustfull eyes, beheld that lovely guest, Faire Pastorella, whose sad mournefull hew Like the faire Morning clad in misty fog did shew.1 4

At sight whereof his barbarous heart was fired, And inly burnt with flames most raging whot, That her alone he for his part2 desired Of all the other pray, which they had got, And her in mynde did to him selfe allot. From that day forth he kyndnesse to her showed, And sought her love, by all the meanes he mote; With looks, with words, with gifts he oft her wowed:3 And mixed threats among, and much unto her vowed.4

5

But all that ever he could doe or say, Her constant mynd could not a whit remove, Nor draw unto the lure of his lewd lay,5 To graunt him favour, or afford him love. Yet ceast he not to sew and all waies prove, By which he mote accomplish his request, Saying and doing all that mote behove;6 Ne day nor night he suffred her to rest, But her all night did watch, and all the day molest.

6

At last, when him she so importune7 saw, Fearing least he at length the raines8 would lend Unto his lust, and make his will his law, Sith in his powre she was to foe or frend, She thought it best, for shadow to pretend Some shew of favour, by him gracing small, That she thereby mote either freely wend,9 Or at more ease continue there his thrall: A little well is lent, that gaineth more withall.

1 His reaction recalls the Salvage Nation’s lust for Serena (viii.41). 2 part: share. 3 wowed: wooed. 4 vowed: promised. 5 lay: song; i.e., plan.

6

behove: promise. importune: persistent. 8 raines: reins. The image is of a man failing to control a horse. 9 freely wend: go free. 7

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7

So from thenceforth, when love he to her made, With better tearmes she did him entertaine, Which gave him hope, and did him halfe perswade, That he in time her joyaunce should obtaine. But when she saw, through that small favours gaine, That further, then she willing was, he prest, She found no meanes to barre him, but to faine A sodaine sickenesse, which her sore opprest, And made unfit to serve his lawlesse mindes behest.

8

By meanes whereof she would not him permit Once to approch to her in privity,1 But onely mongst the rest by her to sit, Mourning the rigour of her malady, And seeking all things meete for remedy. But she resolv’d no remedy to fynde, Nor better cheare to shew in misery, Till Fortune would her captive bonds unbynde, Her sickenesse was not of the body but the mynde.

9

During which space that she thus sicke did lie, It chaunst a sort of merchants, which were wount2 To skim those coastes, for bondmen there to buy, And by such trafficke after gaines to hunt, Arrived in this Isle though bare and blunt,3 T’inquire for slaves; where being readie met By some of these same theeves at the instant brunt,4 Were brought unto their Captaine, who was set By his faire patients side with sorrowfull regret.

10 To whom they shewed, how those marchants were Arriv’d in place, their bondslaves for to buy, And therefore prayd, that those same captives there Mote to them for their most commodity5 Be sold, and mongst them shared equally. This their request the Captaine much appalled;

1

3

2

4

in privity: privately. sort: group, company; wount: accustomed.

bare and blunt: desolate and barren. instant brunt: immediately. 5 commodity: profit.

Canto Eleven

Yet could he not their lust demaund deny, And willed streight the slaves should forth be called, And sold for most advantage not to be forstalled.1 11 Then forth the good old Meliboe was brought, And Coridon, with many other moe, Whom they before in diverse spoyles2 had caught: All which he to the marchants sale did showe. Till some, which did the sundry prisoners knowe, Gan to inquire for that faire shepherdesse, Which with the rest they tooke not long agoe, And gan her forme and feature to expresse,3 The more t’augment her price, through praise of comlinesse. 12 To whom the Captaine in full angry wize Made answere, that the Mayd of whom they spake, Was his owne purchase and his onely prize, With which none had to doe, ne ought partake, But he himselfe, which did that conquest make; Litle for him to have one silly4 lasse: Besides through sicknesse now so wan and weake, That nothing meet in marchandise to passe. So shew’d them her, to prove how pale and weake she was. 13 The sight of whom, though now decayd and mard, And eke but hardly seene by candle-light, Yet like a Diamond of rich regard,5 In doubtfull shadow of the darkesome night, With starrie beames about her shining bright, These marchants fixed eyes did so amaze, That what through wonder, and what through delight, A while on her they greedily did gaze, And did her greatly like, and did her greatly praize. 14 At last when all the rest them offred were, And prises to them placed at their pleasure, They all refused in regard of her, 1

not to be forstalled: none to be retained (as he would like to be the case with Pastorella). 2 spoyles: raids.

3

expresse: describe. silly: simple. 5 regard: value. 4

157

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Ne ought would buy, how ever prisd with measure,1 Withouten her, whose worth above all threasure They did esteeme, and offred store of gold. But then the Captaine fraught with more displeasure, Bad them be still, his love should not be sold: The rest take if they would, he her to him would hold. 15 Therewith some other of the chiefest theeves Boldly him bad2 such injurie forbeare; For that same mayd, how ever it him greeves, Should with the rest be sold before him theare, To make the prises of the rest more deare. That with great rage he stoutly doth denay; And fiercely drawing forth his blade, doth sweare, That who so hardie hand on her doth lay, It dearely shall aby, and death for handsell3 pay. 16 Thus as they words amongst them multiply, They fall to strokes, the frute of too much talke, And the mad steele about doth fiercely fly, Not sparing wight, ne leaving any balke,4 But making way for death at large to walke: Who in the horror of the griesly night, In thousand dreadful shapes doth mongst them stalke, And makes huge havocke, whiles the candlelight Out quenched, leaves no skill5 nor difference of wight. 17 Like as a sort of hungry dogs ymet About some carcase by the common way, Doe fall together, stryving each to get The greatest portion of the greedie pray; All on confused heapes themselves assay,6 And snatch, and byte, and rend, and tug, and teare; That who them sees, would wonder at their fray, And who sees not, would be affrayd to heare. Such was the conflict of those cruell Brigants there.

1

4

2

5

prisd with measure: moderately priced. bad: told. 3 aby: pay; handsell: reward.

balke: exception. skill: distinction. 6 assay: assault.

Canto Eleven

159

18 But first of all, their captives they doe kill, Least they should joyne against the weaker side, Or rise against the remnant at their will; Old Meliboe is slaine, and him beside His aged wife, with many others wide,1 But Coridon escaping craftily, Creepes forth of dores, whilst darknes him doth hide, And flyes away as fast as he can hye, Ne stayeth leave to take, before his friends doe dye. 19 But Pastorella, wofull wretched Elfe, Was by the Captaine all this while defended, Who minding more her safety then himselfe, His target alwayes over her pretended;2 By meanes whereof, that mote not be amended, He at the length was slaine, and layd on ground, Yet holding fast twixt both his armes extended Fayre Pastorell, who with the selfe same wound Launcht3 through the arme, fell down with him in drerie swound. 20 There lay she covered with confused preasse4 Of carcases, which dying on her fell. Tho when as he was dead, the fray gan ceasse, And each to other calling, did compell To stay their cruell hands from slaughter fell, Sith they that were the cause of all, were gone. Thereto they all attonce agreed well, And lighting candles new, gan search anone, How many of their friends were slaine, how many fone.5 21 Their Captaine there they cruelly found kild, And in his armes the dreary6 dying mayd, Like a sweet Angell twixt two clouds uphild:7 Her lovely light was dimmed and decayd, With cloud of death upon her eyes displayd; Yet did the cloud make even that dimmed light 1

4

2

5

wide: round about. target: shield; pretended: stretched, covered. 3 Launcht: pierced.

preasse: heap. fone: foes. 6 dreary: sad. 7 uphild: held up.

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Seeme much more lovely in that darknesse layd, And twixt the twinckling of her eye-lids bright, To sparke out litle beames, like starres in foggie night. 22 But when they mov’d the carcases aside, They found that life did yet in her remaine: Then all their helpes they busily applyde, To call the soule backe to her home againe; And wrought so well with labour and long paine, That they to life recovered her at last. Who sighing sore, as if her hart in twaine Had riven bene, and all her hart strings brast,1 With drearie drouping eyne2 lookt up like one aghast. 23 There she beheld, that sore her griev’d to see, Her father and her friends about her lying, Her selfe sole left, a second spoyle to bee Of those, that having saved her from dying, Renew’d her death by timely death denying: What now is left her, but to wayle and weepe, Wringing her hands, and ruefully loud crying? Ne cared she her wound in teares to steepe, Albe with all their might those Brigants her did keepe. 24 But when they saw her now reliv’d3 againe, They left her so, in charge of one the best Of many worst, who with unkind disdaine And cruell rigour her did much molest; Scarse yeelding her due food, or timely rest, And scarsely suffring her infestred4 wound, That sore her payn’d, by any to be drest. So leave we her in wretched thraldome bound, And turne we backe to Calidore, where we him found. 25 Who when he backe returned from the wood, And saw his shepheards cottage spoyled quight, And his love reft away, he wexed wood,

1 2

brast: burst. eyne: eyes.

3 4

reliv’d: restored to life. infestred: festering.

Canto Eleven

161

And halfe enraged at that ruefull sight, That even his hart for very fell despight, And his owne flesh he readie was to teare, He chauft,1 he griev’d, he fretted, and he sight, And fared2 like a furious wyld Beare, Whose whelpes are stolne away, she being otherwhere. 26 Ne wight he found, to whom he might complaine, Ne wight he found, of whom he might inquire; That more increast the anguish of his paine. He sought the woods; but no man could see there, He sought the plaines; but could no tydings heare. The woods did nought but ecchoes vaine rebound; The playnes all waste and emptie did appeare: Where wont3 the shepheards oft their pypes resound, And feed an hundred flocks, there now not one he found. 27 At last as there he romed up and downe, He chaunst one comming towards him to spy, That seem’d to be some sorie simple clowne, With ragged weedes, and lockes upstaring4 hye, As if he did from some late daunger fly, And yet his feare did follow him behynd: Who as he unto him approched nye, He mote perceive by signes, which he did fynd, That Coridon it was, the silly shepherds hynd.5 28 Tho to him running fast, he did not stay To greet him first, but askt where were the rest; Where Pastorell? who full of fresh dismay, And gushing forth in teares, was so opprest,6 That he no word could speake, but smit his brest, And up to heaven his eyes fast streming7 threw. Whereat the knight amaz’d, yet did not rest, But askt againe, what ment that rufull hew: Where was his Pastorell? where all the other crew? 1

5

2

6

chauft: became angry. fared: acted. 3 wont: used to, were accustomed to. 4 lockes upstaring: hair standing on end.

hynd: servant. opprest: surprised. 7 streming: crying (streaming with tears).

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29 “Ah well away” (sayd he then sighing sore) “That ever I did live, this day to see, This dismall day, and was not dead before, Before I saw faire Pastorella dye.” “Die? out alas” then Calidore did cry: “How could the death dare ever her to quell?1 But read2 thou shepheard, read what destiny, Or other dyrefull hap3 from heaven or hell Hath wrought this wicked deed, doe4 feare away, and tell.” 30 Tho when the shepheard breathed had a whyle, He thus began: “where shall I then commence This wofull tale? or how those Brigants vyle, With cruell rage and dreadfull violence Spoyld all our cots, and caried us from hence? Or how faire Pastorell should have bene sold To marchants, but was sav’d with strong defence? Or how those theeves, whilest one sought her to hold, Fell all at ods, and fought through fury fierce and bold. 31 “In that same conflict (woe is me) befell This fatall chaunce, this dolefull accident, Whose heavy tydings now I have to tell. First all the captives, which they here had hent,5 Were by them slaine by generall consent; Old Meliboe and his good wife withall These eyes saw die, and dearely did lament: But when the lot to Pastorell did fall, Their Captaine long withstood, and did her death forstall.6 32 “But what could he gainst all them doe alone? It could not boot;7 needs mote she die at last: I onely scapt8 through great confusione Of cryes and clamors, which amongst them past, In dreadfull darknesse dreadfully aghast; That better were with them to have bene dead, 1

5

2

6

quell: kill. read: tell. 3 hap: fortune, fate. 4 doe: put.

hent: seized. forstall: prevent, postpone. 7 boot: succeed. 8 scapt: escaped.

Canto Eleven

Then here to see all desolate and wast, Despoyled of those joyes and jolly head,1 Which with those gentle shepherds here I wont to lead.” 33 When Calidore these ruefull newes had raught,2 His hart quite deaded was with anguish great, And all his wits with doole3 were nigh distraught, That he his face, his head, his brest did beat, And death it selfe unto himselfe did threat; Oft cursing th’heavens, that so cruell were To her, whose name he often did repeat; And wishing oft, that he were present there, When she was slaine, or had bene to her succour4 nere. 34 But after griefe awhile had had his course, And spent it selfe in mourning, he at last Began to mitigate his swelling sourse,5 And in his mind with better reason cast, How he might save her life, if life did last; Or if that dead, how he her death might wreake,6 Sith otherwise he could not mend thing past; Or if it to revenge he were too weake, Then for to die with her, and his lives threed to breake. 35 Tho Coridon he prayd, sith he well knew The readie way unto that theevish wonne,7 To wend with him, and be his conduct8 trew Unto the place, to see what should be donne. But he, whose hart through feare was late fordonne,9 Would not for ought be drawne to former drede, But by all meanes the daunger knowne did shonne: Yet Calidore so well him wrought with meed,10 And faire bespoke with words, that he at last agreed.

1

6

2

7

jolly head: merriment, revelry. ruefull: sad; raught: received. 3 doole: grief, sorrow. 4 succour: help. 5 mitigate his swelling sourse: i.e., stop his well of tears.

wreake: revenge. wonne: dwelling, lair. 8 conduct: guide. 9 fordonne: overcome. 10 meed: rewards, bribes.

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36 So forth they goe together (God before) Both clad in shepheards weeds agreeably,1 And both with shepheards hookes: But Calidore Had underneath, him armed privily.2 Tho to the place when they approched nye, They chaunst, upon an hill not farre away, Some flockes of sheepe and shepheards to espy; To whom they both agreed to take their way, In hope there newes to learne, how they mote best assay.3 37 There did they find, that which they did not feare,4 The selfe same flocks, the which those theeves had reft5 From Meliboe and from themselves whyleare, And certaine of the theeves there by them left, The which for want of heards6 themselves then kept. Right well knew Coridon his owne late sheepe, And seeing them, for tender pittie wept: But when he saw the theeves, which did them keepe His hart gan fayle, albe he saw them all asleepe. 38 But Calidore recomforting7 his griefe, Though not his feare: for nought may feare disswade;8 Him hardly9 forward drew, whereas the thiefe Lay sleeping soundly in the bushes shade, Whom Coridon him counseld to invade10 Now all unwares, and take the spoyle away; But he, that in his mind had closely11 made A further purpose, would not so them slay, But gently waking them, gave them the time of day.12 39 Tho sitting downe by them upon the greene, Of sundrie things he purpose gan to faine;13 That he by them might certaine tydings weene14 1 2

agreeably: similarly.

privily: secretly. 3 assay: act, proceed. 4 feare: expect, anticipate. 5 reft: seized, taken. 6 heards: shepherds. 7 recomforting: consoling. 8 disswade: deter.

9

hardly: strongly, forcibly.

10

invade: attack. closely: secretly. 12 The humorous last line suggests that Calidore is, yet again, making inappropriate conversation. 13 purpose: conversation; faine: make. 14 weene: learn. 11

Canto Eleven

165

Of Pastorell, were she alive or slaine. Mongst which the theeves them questioned againe, What mister1 men, and eke from whence they were. To whom they answer’d, as did appertaine,2 That they were poore heardgroomes, the which whylere Had from their maisters fled, and now sought hyre elswhere. 40 Whereof right glad they seem’d, and offer made To hyre them well, if they their flockes would keepe: For they themselves were evill groomes,3 they sayd, Unwont with heards to watch, or pasture sheepe, But to forray the land, or scoure the deepe. Thereto they soone agreed, and earnest4 tooke, To keepe their flockes for litle hyre and chepe:5 For they for better hyre did shortly looke, So there all day they bode,6 till light the sky forsooke. 41 Tho when as towards darksome night it drew, Unto their hellish dens those theeves them brought, Where shortly they in great acquaintance grew, And all the secrets of their entrayles7 sought. There did they find, contrarie to their thought, That Pastorell yet liv’d, but all the rest Were dead, right so as Coridon had taught: Whereof they both full glad and blyth did rest, But chiefly Calidore, whom griefe had most possest. 42 At length when they occasion fittest found, In dead of night, when all the theeves did rest After a late forray, and slept full sound, Sir Calidore him arm’d,8 as he thought best, Having of late by diligent inquest,9 Provided him a sword of meanest sort: With which he streight went to the Captaines nest. But Coridon durst not with him consort, Ne durst abide behind, for dread of worse effort.10 1

mister: sort of. appertaine: appear. 3 evill groomes: poor workers. 4 earnest: pledge. 5 hyre and chepe: wages and charge. 2

6

bode: stayed. entrayles: inner thoughts (lit. interior). 8 The sense suggests that Calidore arms Coridon. 9 inquest: search. 10 effort: force. 7

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43 When to the Cave they came, they found it fast: But Calidore with huge resistlesse might, The dores assayled, and the locks upbrast. With noyse whereof the theefe awaking light,1 Unto the entrance ran: where the bold knight Encountring him with small resistance slew; The whiles faire Pastorell through great affright Was almost dead, misdoubting least of new2 Some uprore were like that, which lately she did vew. 44 But when as Calidore was comen in, And gan aloud for Pastorell to call, Knowing his voice although not heard long sin,3 She sudden was revived therewithall, And wondrous joy felt in her spirits thrall:4 Like him that being long in tempest tost, Looking each houre into deathes mouth to fall, At length espyes at hand the happie cost,5 On which he safety hopes, that earst feard to be lost. 45 Her gentle hart, that now long season past Had never joyance felt, nor chearefull thought, Began some smacke of comfort new to tast, Like lyfull6 heat to nummed senses brought, And life to feele, that long for death had sought; Ne lesse in hart rejoyced Calidore, When he her found, but like to one distraught And robd of reason, towards her him bore, A thousand times embrast, and kist a thousand more. 46 But now by this, with noyse of late uprore, The hue and cry was raysed all about; And all the Brigants flocking in great store, Unto the cave gan preasse, nought having dout Of that was doen,7 and entred in a rout. But Calidore in th’entry close did stand, 1

5

2

6

light: quickly, immediately. misdoubting: afraid; of new: anew. 3 sin: since. 4 thrall: thrill, surge.

cost: place, point. lyfull: life giving. 7 that was doen: what was being done.

Canto Eleven

And entertayning1 them with courage stout, Still slew the formost, that came first to hand, So long till all the entry was with bodies mand.2 47 Tho when no more could nigh to him approch, He breath’d his sword, and rested him till day: Which when he spyde upon the earth t’encroch,3 Through the dead carcases he made his way, Mongst which he found a sword of better say,4 With which he forth went into th’open light: Where all the rest for him did readie stay, And fierce assayling him, with all their might Gan all upon him lay: there gan a dreadfull fight. 48 How many flyes in whottest sommers day Do seize upon some beast, whose flesh is bare, That all the place with swarmes do overlay, And with their litle stings right felly fare;5 So many theeves about him swarming are, All which do him assayle on every side, And sore oppresse, ne any him doth spare: But he doth with his raging brond6 divide Their thickest troups, and round about him scattreth wide. 49 Like as a Lion mongst an heard of dere, Disperseth them to catch his choysest pray; So did he fly amongst them here and there, And all that nere him came, did hew and slay, Till he had strowd7 with bodies all the way; That none his daunger8 daring to abide, Fled from his wrath, and did themselves convay Into their caves, their heads from death to hide, Ne any left, that victorie to him envide.9

1

6

2

7

entertayning: welcoming. mand: piled. 3 t’encroch: to advance; i.e., the day. 4 say: temper, fitness. 5 felly fare: cruelly made.

brond: sword, blade. strowd: strewn. 8 daunger: power. 9 envide: avoided.

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50 Then backe returning to his dearest deare, He her gan to recomfort, all he might, With gladfull speaches, and with lovely cheare,1 And forth her bringing to the joyous light, Whereof she long had lackt the wishfull sight, Deviz’d all goodly meanes, from her to drive The sad remembrance of her wretched plight. So her uneath2 at last he did revive, That long had lyen dead, and made againe alive. 51 This doen, into those theevish dens he went, And thence did all the spoyles and threasures take, Which they from many long had robd and rent, But fortune now the victors meed did make; Of which the best he did his love betake;3 And also all those flockes, which they before Had reft from Meliboe and from his make,4 He did them all to Coridon restore. So drove them all away, and his love with him bore.

1 2

lovely cheare: loving expression. uneath: with difficulty.

3 4

betake: give to. make: mate, partner.

Canto Twelve Fayre Pastorella by great hap1 her parents understands, Calidore doth the Blatant beast subdew, and bynd in bands.

1

Like as a ship, that through the Ocean wyde Directs her course unto one certaine cost,2 Is met of many a counter winde and tyde, With which her winged speed is let3 and crost, And she her selfe in stormie surges tost; Yet making many a borde, and many a bay,4 Still winneth way, ne hath her compasse5 lost: Right so it fares with me in this long way, Whose course is often stayd, yet never is astray.

2

For all that hetherto hath long delayd This gentle knight, from sewing6 his first quest, Though out of course, yet hath not bene mis-sayd,7 To shew the courtesie by him profest, Even unto the lowest and the least. But now I come into my course againe, To his atchievement8 of the Blatant beast; Who all this while at will did range and raine, Whilst none was him to stop, nor none him to restraine.

3

Sir Calidore when thus he now had raught9 Faire Pastorella from those Brigants powre, Unto the Castle of Belgard10 her brought,

1

hap: good fortune. cost: coast. 3 let: hindered. 4 I.e., tacking and following the direction of the wind. Spenser reminds readers that sailing is difficult and subject to the whims of fortune and the elements. 5 compasse: course. 2

6

sewing: pursuing, following. mis-sayd: speak wrongly, abuse; but there would also appear to be a pun on “missed.” Spenser’s narrator is commenting on the irrelevance of Calidore, and his own slighting of the knight. 8 atchievement: successful quest. 9 raught: taken. 10 Belgard: good view. 7

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Whereof was Lord the good Sir Bellamoure;1 Who whylome was in his youthes freshest flowre A lustie knight, as ever wielded speare, And had endured many a dreadfull stoure2 In bloudy battell for a Ladie deare, The fayrest Ladie then of all that living were. 4

Her name was Claribell,3 whose father hight The Lord of Many Ilands,4 farre renound For his great riches and his greater might. He through the wealth, wherein he did abound, This daughter thought in wedlocke to have bound Unto the Prince of Picteland 5 bordering nere, But she whose sides before with secret wound Of love to Bellamoure empierced were, By all meanes shund to match with any forrein fere.6

5

And Bellamour againe7 so well her pleased, With dayly service and attendance dew, That of her love he was entyrely seized, And closely8 did her wed, but knowne to few. Which when her father understood, he grew In so great rage, that them in dongeon deepe Without compassion cruelly he threw; Ye did so streightly9 them a sunder keepe, That neither could to company of th’other creepe.

6

Nathlesse Sir Bellamour, whether through grace Or secret guifts so with his keepers wrought,10 That to his love sometimes he came in place, Whereof her wombe unwist to wight was fraught,11 And in dew time a mayden child forth brought. Which she streight way for dread least, if her syre

1

6

2

7

Bellamoure: fair lover. stoure: encounter. 3 Claribell: famous beauty. 4 Many Ilands: possibly alluding to the islands, the Shetlands and Hebrides, around the north coast of Scotland. 5 Picteland: Scotland.

fere: husband. againe: in return. 8 closely: secretly. 9 streightly: strictly. 10 wrought: dealt (lit. made). 11 fraught: filled.

Canto Twelve

Should know thereof, to slay he would have sought, Delivered to her handmayd, that for hyre She should it cause be fostred under straunge attyre. 7

The trustie damzell bearing it abrode Into the emptie fields, where living wight Mote not bewray1 the secret of her lode, She forth gan lay unto the open light The litle babe, to take thereof a sight.2 Whom whylest she did with watrie eyne behold, Upon the litle brest like christall bright, She mote perceive a litle purple mold,3 That like a rose her silken leaves did faire unfold.

8

Well she it markt, and pittied the more, Yet could not remedie her wretched case, But closing it againe like as before, Bedeaw’d with teares there left it in the place: Yet left not quite, but drew a litle space Behind the bushes, where she her did hyde, To weet what mortall hand, or heavens grace Would for the wretched infants helpe provyde, For which it loudly cald, and pittifully cryde.

9

At length a Shepheard, which there by did keepe His fleecie flocke upon the playnes around, Led with the infants cry, that loud did weepe, Came to the place, where when he wrapped found Th’abandond spoyle, he softly it unbound; And seeing there, that did him pittie sore, He tooke it up, and in his mantle wound; So home unto his honest wife it bore, Who as her owne it nurst, and named evermore.

10 Thus long continu’d Claribell a thrall, And Bellamour in bands, till that her syre Departed life, and left unto them all. Then all the stormes of fortunes former yre4 1 2

bewray: reveal. to take thereof a sight: to get a look at.

3 4

mold: mole, birthmark. yre: anger.

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Were turnd, and they to freedome did retyre.1 Thenceforth they joy’d in happinesse together, And lived long in peace and love entyre, Without disquiet or dislike of ether, Till time that Calidore brought Pastorella thether. 11 Both whom they goodly well did entertaine; For Bellamour knew Calidore right well, And loved for his prowesse, sith they twaine Long since had fought in field. Als2 Claribell No lesse did tender3 the faire Pastorell, Seeing her weake and wan, through durance4 long. There they a while together thus did dwell In much delight, and many joyes among, Untill the damzell gan to wex more sound and strong. 12 Tho gan Sir Calidore him to advize5 Of his first quest, which he had long forlore,6 Asham’d to thinke, how he that enterprize, The which the Faery Queene had long afore Bequeath’d to him, forslacked7 had so sore; That much he feared, least reprochfull blame With foule dishonour him mote blot therefore; Besides the losse of so much loos8 and fame, As through the world thereby should glorifie his name.9 13 Therefore resolving to returne in hast Unto so great atchievement, he bethought To leave his love, now perill being past, With Claribell, whylest he that monster sought Throughout the world, and to destruction brought. So taking leave of his faire Pastorell, Whom to recomfort, all the meanes he wrought, With thanks to Bellamour and Claribell, He went forth on his quest, and did, that him befell. 1

6

2

7

retyre: return. Als: also. 3 tender: hold precious. 4 durance: suffering. 5 advize: consider.

forlore: abandoned. forslacked: neglected. 8 loos: praise, honor. 9 This description suggests that Calidore is confused and has given in to unworthy motives. See Introduction, “Calidore’s Quest.”

Canto Twelve

14 But first, ere I doe his adventures tell, In this exploite, me needeth to declare, What did betide to the faire Pastorell, During his absence left in heavy care,1 Through daily mourning, and nightly misfare:2 Yet did that auncient matrone all she might, To cherish her with all things choice and rare; And her owne handmayd, that Melissa3 hight, Appointed to attend her dewly day and night. 15 Who in a morning, when this Mayden faire Was dighting4 her, having her snowy brest As yet not laced, nor her golden haire Into their comely tresses dewly drest, Chaunst to espy upon her yvory chest The rosie marke, which she remembred well That litle Infant had, which forth she kest, The daughter of her Lady Claribell, The which she bore, the whiles in prison she did dwell. 16 Which well avizing,5 streight she gan to cast In her conceiptfull6 mynd, that this faire Mayd Was that same infant, which so long sith past She in the open fields had loosely layd To fortunes spoile, unable it to ayd. So full of joy, streight forth she ran in hast Unto her mistresse, being halfe dismayd,7 To tell her, how the heavens had her graste,8 To save her chylde, which in misfortunes mouth was plaste. 17 The sober mother seeing such her mood, Yet knowing not, what meant that sodaine thro,9 Askt her, how mote her words be understood, And what the matter was, that mov’d her so.

1

5

2

6

care: grief. misfare: sorrow. 3 Melissa: “honey bee” (cf. Meliboe, ix.16). 4 dighting: dressing.

avizing: noticing, registering. conceiptfull: perceptive. 7 dismayd: nervous, worried. 8 graste: graced. 9 thro: surge of emotion.

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“My liefe”1 (sayd she) “ye know, that long ygo, Whilest ye in durance2 dwelt, ye to me gave A little mayde, the which ye chylded tho;3 The same againe if now ye list to have, The same is yonder Lady, whom high God did save.” 18 Much was the Lady troubled at that speach, And gan to question streight how she it knew. “Most certaine markes,” (sayd she) “do me it teach, For on her brest I with these eyes did vew The litle purple rose, which thereon grew, Whereof her name ye then to her did give.4 Besides her countenaunce, and her likely hew,5 Matched with equall yeares, do surely prieve6 That yond same is your daughter sure, which yet doth live.” 19 The matrone stayd no lenger to enquire, But forth in hast ran to the straunger Mayd; Whom catching greedily for great desire, Rent up her brest, and bosome open layd, In which that rose she plainely saw displayd. Then her embracing twixt her armes twaine, She long so held, and softly weeping sayd; “And livest thou my daughter now againe? And art thou yet alive, whom dead I long did faine?”7 20 Tho further asking her of sundry things, And times comparing with their accidents,8 She found at last by very certaine signes, And speaking markes of passed monuments,9 That this young Mayd, whom chance to her presents Is her owne daughter, her owne infant deare.

1

5

2

6

liefe: dear. durance: captivity. 3 chylded tho: then gave birth to. 4 The name is never revealed, but the reference to a rose hints that it might be Rosalind, who appears in The Shepheardes Calender as Colin Clout’s scornful love.

likely hew: similar appearance. prieve: prove. 7 faine: imagine. 8 accidents: when they happened. 9 I.e., visible signs (writing) of records of the past.

Canto Twelve

175

Tho wondring long at those so straunge events, A thousand times she her embraced nere, With many a joyfull kisse, and many a melting teare. 21 Who ever is the mother of one chylde, Which having thought long dead, she fyndes alive, Let her by proofe of that, which she hath fylde1 In her owne breast, this mothers joy descrive: For other none such passion can contrive In perfect forme, as this good Lady felt, When she so faire a daughter saw survive, As Pastorella was, that nigh she swelt2 For passing joy, which did all into pitty melt. 22 Thence running forth unto her loved Lord, She unto him recounted, all that fell:3 Who joyning joy with her in one accord, Acknowledg’d for his owne faire Pastorell. There leave we them in joy, and let us tell Of Calidore, who seeking all this while That monstrous Beast by finall force to quell,4 Through every place, with restlesse paine and toile Him follow’d, by the tract of his outragious spoile.5 23 Through all estates6 he found that he had past, In which he many massacres had left, And to the Clergy now was come at last; In which such spoile, such havocke, and such theft He wrought, that thence all goodnesse he bereft, That endlesse were to tell. The Elfin Knight, Who now no place besides unsought had left, At length into a Monastere did light,7 Where he him found despoyling all with maine and might.

1

fylde: felt. swelt: fainted. 3 fell: happened. 4 quell: overcome, kill. 5 spoile: plundering. 6 estates: ranks of people. 2

7

Monastere: monastery; light: come across by chance. The target of the Blatant Beast’s rapaciousness has troubled commentators on the poem. Ben Jonson saw the Beast as a satire on Puritanism and the destruction of the Catholic past.

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24 Into their cloysters now he broken had, Through which the Monckes he chaced here and there. And them pursu’d into their dortours sad,1 And searched all their cels and secrets neare;2 In which what filth and ordure did appeare,3 Were yrkesome4 to report; yet that foule Beast Nought sparing them, the more did tosse and teare, And ransacke all their dennes from most to least, Regarding nought religion, nor their holy heast.5 25 From thence into the sacred Church he broke, And robd the Chancell, and the deskes6 downe threw, And Altars fouled, and blasphemy spoke, And th’Images for all their goodly hew, Did cast to ground, whilest none was them to rew;7 So all confounded and disordered there. But seeing Calidore, away he flew, Knowing his fatall hand by former feare; But he him fast pursuing, soone approched neare. 26 Him in a narrow place he overtooke, And fierce assailing forst him turne againe: Sternely8 he turnd againe, when he him strooke With his sharpe steele, and ran at him amaine9 With open mouth, that seemed to containe A full good pecke within the utmost brim,10 All set with yron teeth in raunges11 twaine, That terrifide his foes, and armed him, Appearing like the mouth of Orcus12 griesly grim.

1

dortours: dormitories; sad: orderly, serious. 2 secrets neare: nearby secret places. 3 A line that might suggest that the targets of the Beast’s attacks are not always innocent. 4 yrkesome: loathsome. 5 heast: vow. 6 Chancell: the most sacred part of the church, near the altar; deskes: choir seats.

7

Spenser appears to be describing the iconoclastic fervor of the more fervent Protestants, who destroyed sacred images as blasphemous. 8 Sternely: fiercely. 9 amaine: immediately. 10 pecke: bite; brim: limit, edge. 11 raunges: rows. 12 Orcus: Pluto, the God of Hell.

Canto Twelve

27 And therein were a thousand tongs empight,1 Of sundry kindes, and sundry quality, Some were of dogs, that barked day and night, And some of cats, that wrawling2 still did cry. And some of Beares, that groynd3 continually, And some of Tygres, that did seeme to gren,4 And snar5 at all, that ever passed by: But most of them were tongues of mortall men, Which spake reprochfully,6 not caring where nor when. 28 And them amongst were mingled here and there, The tongues of Serpents with three forked stings, That spat out poyson and gore bloudy gere7 At all, that came within his ravenings,8 And spake licentious words, and hatefull things Of good and bad alike, of low and hie; Ne Kesars spared he a whit, nor Kings, But either blotted them with infamie, Or bit them with his banefull9 teeth of injury. 29 But Calidore thereof no whit afrayd, Rencountred10 him with so impetuous might, That th’outrage11 of his violence he stayd, And bet12 abacke, threatning in vaine to bite, And spitting forth the poyson of his spight, That fomed all about his bloody jawes. Tho rearing up his former13 feete on hight, He rampt14 upon him with his ravenous pawes, As if he would have rent him with his cruell clawes. 30 But he right well aware, his rage to ward, Did cast his shield atweene, and therewithall Putting his puissaunce15 forth, pursu’d so hard, 1

9

2

10

empight: implanted. wrawling: mewing, screeching. 3 groynd: growled. 4 gren: bear their teeth. 5 snar: snarl. 6 reprochfully: abusively. 7 gere: matter. 8 ravenings: ravings.

banefull: evil. Rencountred: faced up to him. 11 outrage: fury. 12 bet: beat. 13 former: front. 14 rampt: reared up on his hind legs. 15 puissaunce: strength, power.

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That backeward he enforced him to fall, And being downe, ere he new helpe could call, His shield he on him threw, and fast downe held, Like as a bullocke, that in bloudy stall Of butchers balefull hand to ground is feld, Is forcibly kept downe, till he be throughly queld. 31 Full cruelly the Beast did rage and rore, To be downe held, and maystred so with might, That he gan fret and fome out bloudy gore, Striving in vaine to rere him selfe upright. For still the more he strove, the more the Knight Did him suppresse, and forcibly subdew; That made him almost mad for fell despight. He grind, hee bit, he scratcht, he venim threw, And fared1 like a feend, right horrible in hew. 32 Or like the hell-borne Hydra, which they faine2 That great Alcides3 whilome overthrew, After that he had labourd long in vaine, To crop his thousand heads, the which still new Forth budded, and in greater number grew. Such was the fury of this hellish Beast, Whilest Calidore him under him downe threw; Who nathemore his heavy load releast, But aye the more he rag’d, the more his powre increast. 33 Tho when the Beast saw, he mote nought availe, By force, he gan his hundred tongues apply, And sharpely at him to revile and raile, With bitter termes of shamefull infamy; Oft interlacing many a forged lie, Whose like he never once did speake, nor heare, Nor ever thought thing so unworthily: Yet did he nought for all that him forbeare, But strained him so streightly,4 that he chokt him neare. 1

fared: acted. Hydra: a sibling of the Blatant Beast, a many-headed monster and product of the union of Echidna and Typhon; faine: knew. 2

3

Alcides: Hercules. strained him so streightly: pushed down on him so tightly. 4

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34 At last when as he found his force to shrincke,1 And rage to quaile,2 he tooke a muzzell strong Of surest yron, made with many a lincke; Therewith he mured3 up his mouth along, And therein shut up his blasphemous tong, For never more defaming gentle Knight, Or unto lovely Lady doing wrong: And thereunto a great long chaine he tight,4 With which he drew him forth, even in his own despight.5 35 Like as whylome that strong Tirynthian swaine,6 Brought forth with him the dreadfull dog of hell,7 Against his will fast bound in yron chaine, And roring horribly, did him compell To see the hatefull sunne, that he might tell To griesly Pluto, what on earth was donne, And to the other damned ghosts, which dwell For aye in darkenesse, which day light doth shone. So led this Knight his captyve with like conquest wonne. 36 Yet greatly did the Beast repine8 at those Straunge bands, whose like till then he never bore, Ne ever any durst till then impose, And chauffed inly, seeing now no more Him liberty was left aloud to rore: Yet durst he not draw backe; nor once withstand The proved powre of noble Calidore, But trembled underneath his mighty hand, And like a fearefull dog him followed through the land. 37 Him through all Faery land he follow’d so, As if he learned had obedience long, That all the people where so he did go, Out of their townes did round about him throng,

1

shrincke: fail. quaile: lessen. 3 mured: closed. 4 tight: tied. 5 even in his own despight: in spite of his defiance. 2

6

Tirynthian swaine: Hercules. Cerberus, the many-headed dog who guards Hell. Binding Cerberus and bringing him up from Hell was the most difficult of Hercules’ twelve labors. 8 repine: complain. 7

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To see him leade that Beast in bondage strong, And seeing it, much wondred at the sight; And all such persons, as he earst1 did wrong, Rejoyced much to see his captive plight, And much admyr’d the Beast, but more admyr’d the Knight. 38 Thus was this Monster by the maystring2 might Of doughty Calidore, supprest and tamed, That never more he mote endammadge3 wight With his vile tongue, which many had defamed, And many causelesse caused to be blamed: So did he eeke long after this remaine, Untill that, whether wicked fate so framed, Or fault of men, he broke his yron chaine, And got into the world at liberty againe.4 39 Thenceforth more mischiefe and more scath5 he wrought To mortall men, then he had done before; Ne ever could by any more be brought Into like bands, ne maystred any more: Albe that long time after Calidore, The good Sir Pelleas him tooke in hand, And after him Sir Lamoracke of yore,6 And all his brethren borne in Britaine land; Yet none of them could ever bring him into band. 40 So now7 he raungeth through the world againe, And rageth sore in8 each degree and state; Ne any is, that may him now restraine, He growen is so great and strong of late, Barking and biting all that him doe bate,9 Albe they worthy blame, or cleare of crime:

1

earst: before. maystring: controlling, all-powerful. 3 endammadge: injure. 4 As no one knows how the Beast escapes, the suggestion is that he may be impossible to tame forever. 5 scath: harm. 2

6 Pelleas and Lamoracke are Knights of the Round Table in Thomas Malory’s Morte D’Arthur. 7 The indeterminate nature of the adverb indicates that the Beast is abroad in the present time. 8 in: against. 9 bate: attack.

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Ne spareth he most learned wits1 to rate, Ne spareth he the gentle Poets rime, But rends2 without regard of person or of time. 41 Ne may this homely verse, of many meanest,3 Hope to escape his venemous despite, More then my former writs,4 all were they clearest From blamefull blot, and free from all that wite,5 With which some wicked tongues did it backebite, And bring into a mighty Peres6 displeasure, That never so deserved to endite.7 Therfore do you my rimes keep better measure, And seeke to please, that now is counted wisemens threasure.8

FINIS.

1

learned wits: in the 1609 folio, this becomes “gentle wits,” which suggests courtiers rather than poets. 2 rends: savages. 3 many meanest: the lowest of the group. 4 writs: writings. 5

wite: blame, censure. mighty Peres: usually assumed to be William Cecil, Lord Burghley (1520– 1598), Elizabeth’s chief minister who was

6

satirized by Spenser in Mother Hubberds Tale (which rather undermines the narrator’s assertion, assuming it is serious). 7 endite: be censured. 8 A bitter concluding line that suggests that pleasing readers is now considered more important than writing well and challenging them, exactly as courtesy is abused and inverted in meaning in the current age (Pr.5).

Title page to the Mutabilitie Cantos in the 1609 edition of The Faerie Queene (STC 23083)

Canto Six Proud Change1 (not pleasd, in mortall things, beneath the Moone,2 to raigne) Pretends,3 as well of Gods, as Men, to be the Soveraine.

1

What man that sees the ever-whirling wheele4

Of Change, the which all mortall things doth sway,5 But that therby doth find, and plainly feele, How MUTABILITY in them doth play Her cruell sports, to many mens decay?6 Which that to all may better yet appeare, I will rehearse7 that whylome I heard say, How she at first her selfe began to reare,8 Gainst all the Gods, and th’empire sought from them to beare.9 2

But first, here falleth fittest to unfold Her antique race and linage ancient, As I have found it registred of old, In Faery Land mongst records permanent: She was, to weet, a daughter by descent Of those old Titans, that did whylome strive With Saturnes sonne for heavens regiment.10 Whom, though high Jove of kingdome did deprive,11 Yet many of their stemme12 long after did survive.

1

6

2

7

Change: Mutabilitie. Mutabilitie reigns beneath the moon because, in standard Renaissance cosmography, the heavens above the moon were held to be constant and unchangeable. What was beneath the moon––i.e., the things of the earth––was subject to mutability. 3 Pretends: claims. 4 The Wheel of Fortune, which was spun at random by the blind goddess, Fortune. 5 sway: control, influence.

decay: destruction. rehearse: tell. 8 reare: rise. 9 beare: take. 10 regiment: kingdom. 11 The story of the wars among the Titans, Saturn, and Jove assumes an ever-increasing importance in The Faerie Queene; in the “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie,” it becomes a myth that underlies the whole of the poem. 12 stemme: line.

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3

And many of them, afterwards obtain’d Great power of Jove, and high authority; As Hecaté,1 in whose almighty hand, He plac’t all rule and principality, To be by her disposed diversly, To Gods, and men, as she them list divide: And drad Bellona,2 that doth sound on hie Warres and allarums unto Nations wide, That makes both heaven and earth to tremble at her pride.

4

So likewise did this Titanesse3 aspire, Rule and dominion to her selfe to gaine; That as a Goddesse, men might her admire, And heavenly honours yield, as to them twaine.4 And first, on earth she sought it to obtaine; Where she such proofe and sad5 examples shewed Of her great power, to many ones great paine, That not men onely (whom she soone subdewed) But eke all other creatures, her bad dooings rewed.6

5

For, she the face of earthly things so changed, That all which Nature had establisht first In good estate, and in meet order ranged, She did pervert, and all their statutes burst:7 And all the worlds faire frame (which none yet durst Of Gods or men to alter or misguide) She alter’d quite, and made them all accurst That God had blest; and did at first provide In that still happy state for ever to abide.

6

Ne shee the lawes of Nature onely brake, But eke of Justice, and of Policie;8 And wrong of right, and bad of good did make, And death for life exchanged foolishlie: Since which, all living wights have learn’d to die,

1

Hecaté: the goddess who presided over magic and witches. 2 Bellona: the goddess of war. 3 Titanesse: i.e., Mutabilitie. 4 twaine: both; i.e., Hecaté and Bellona.

5

sad: serious. rewed: were sorry about. 7 statutes burst: laws broke. 8 Policie: government. 6

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And all this world is woxen daily worse. Of pittious worke of MUTABILITIE! By which, we all are subject to that curse, And death in stead of life have sucked from our Nurse.1 7

And now, when all the earth she thus had brought To her behest, and thralled to her might, She gan to cast2 in her ambitious thought, T’attempt3 th’empire of the heavens hight, And Jove himselfe to shoulder from his right. And first, she past the region of the ayre, And of the fire, whose substance thin and slight, Made no resistance, ne could her contraire,4 But ready passage to her pleasure did prepaire.

8

Thence, to the Circle of the Moone she clambe, Where Cynthia5 raignes in everlasting glory, To whose bright shining palace straight she came, All fairely deckt with heavens goodly story;6 Whose silver gates (by which there sate an hory Old aged Sire, with hower-glasse in hand, Hight Tyme) she entred, were he liefe or sory:7 Ne staide till she the highest stage had scand,8 Where Cynthia did sit, that never still did stand.

9

Her sitting on an Ivory throne shee found, Drawne of two steeds, th’one black, the other white, Environd with tenne thousand starres around, That duly her attended day and night; And by her side, there ran her Page, that hight Vesper,9 whom we the Evening-starre intend:

1

our Nurse: Nature. cast: plan. 3 attempt: attack. 4 contraire: oppose. 5 Cynthia: Diana, the goddess of chastity, hunting, and the moon; she was also a common representation of Elizabeth, as Spenser’s “The Letter to Raleigh” makes clear. 2

6

story: figures. Tyme: Time marks the boundary between the earth, subject to change, and the constant heavens; liefe or sory: willing or unwilling. 8 scand: climbed. 9 Vesper: Hesperus, the evening star. 7

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That with his Torche, still twinkling like twylight, Her lightened all the way where she should wend, And joy to weary wandring travailers did lend: 10 That when the hardy Titanesse beheld The goodly building of her Palace bright, Made of the heavens substance, and up-held With thousand Crystall pillors of huge hight, Shee gan to burne in her ambitious spright, And t’envie her that in such glorie raigned. Eftsoones she cast by force and tortious1 might, Her to displace, and to her selfe to have gained The kingdome of the Night, and waters by her wained.2 11 Boldly she bid the Goddesse downe descend, And let her selfe into that Ivory throne; For, shee her selfe more worthy thereof wend,3 And better able it to guide alone: Whether to men, whose fall she did bemone, Or unto Gods, whose state she did maligne,4 Or to th’infernall Powers, her need give lone Of her faire light, and bounty most benigne, Her selfe of all that rule shee deemed most condigne.5 12 But shee that had to her that soveraigne seat By highest Jove assign’d, therein to beare Nights burning lamp, regarded not her threat, Ne yielded ought for favour or for feare; But with sterne countenaunce and disdainfull cheare,6 Bending her horned browes, did put her back: And boldly blaming her for comming there, Bade her attonce from heavens coast to pack,7 Or at her perill bide the wrathfull Thunders wrack.8

1

4

2

5

tortious: wrong, wicked. wained: carried along; probably referring to the moon’s power over the tides, but also hinting at the moon’s power diminishing (waning). 3 wend: considered, thought.

maligne: envy. condigne: valuable, worthy. 6 cheare: expression. 7 coast: boundary; pack: retreat. 8 wrack: vengeance.

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13 Yet nathemore the Giantesse forbare: But boldly preacing-on, raught1 forth her hand To pluck her downe perforce2 from off her chaire; And there-with lifting up her golden wand, Threatned to strike her if she did with-stand. Where-at the starres, which round about her blazed, And eke the Moones bright wagon, still did stand, All beeing with so bold attempt amazed, And on her uncouth habit and sterne looke still gazed. 14 Meane-while, the lower World, which nothing knew Of all that chaunced here, was darkned quite; And eke the heavens, and all the heavenly crew Of happy wights, now unpurvaide3 of light, Were much afraid, and wondred at that sight; Fearing least Chaos broken had his chaine,4 And brought againe on them eternall night: But chiefely Mercury,5 that next doth raigne, Ran forth in haste, unto the king of Gods to plaine.6 15 All ran together with a great out-cry, To Joves faire Palace, fixt in heavens hight; And beating at his gates full earnestly, Gan call to him aloud with all their might, To know what meant that suddaine lack of light. The father of the Gods when this he heard, Was troubled much at their so strange affright,7 Doubting least Typhon were againe uprear’d,8 Or other his old foes, that once him sorely fear’d. 16 Eftsoones the sonne of Maia9 forth he sent Downe to the Circle of the Moone, to knowe The cause of this so strange astonishment, 1 preacing-on: pressing on; raught: reached. 2 perforce: with force. 3 unpurvaide: deprived. 4 A common representation of Chaos, who, like the Blatant Beast (VI.xii.38), is always threatening to break his chains and roam freely throughout the universe.

5

Mercury: the messenger of the Gods. plaine: complain. 7 affright: fear, commotion. 8 Typhon: one of the most powerful Titans, who waged a long war against the Gods. He was eventually imprisoned by Jove under Mount Aetna; uprear’d: uprisen. 9 sonne of Maia: Mercury. 6

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And why shee did her wonted course forslowe;1 And if that any were on earth belowe That did with charmes or Magick her molest, Him to attache,2 and downe to hell to throwe: But, if from heaven it were, then to arrest The Author, and him bring before his presence prest.3 17 The wingd-foot God, so fast his plumes4 did beat, That soone he came where-as the Titanesse Was striving with faire Cynthia for her seat: At whose strange sight, and haughty hardinesse,5 He wondred much, and feared her no lesse. Yet laying feare aside to doe his charge, At last, he bade her (with bold stedfastnesse) Ceasse to molest the Moone to walke at large,6 Or come before high Jove, her dooings to discharge.7 18 And there-with-all, he on her shoulder laid His snaky-wreathed Mace,8 whose awfull power Doth make both Gods and hellish fiends affraid: Where-at the Titanesse did sternely lower,9 And stoutly answer’d, that in evill hower He from his Jove such message to her brought, To bid her leave faire Cynthias silver bower; Sith shee his Jove and him esteemed nought, No more then Cynthia’s selfe; but all their kingdoms sought. 19 The Heavens Herald staid not to reply, But past away, his doings to relate Unto his Lord; who now in th’highest sky, Was placed in his principall Estate, With all the Gods about him congregate: To whom when Hermes10 had his message told,

1

7

2

8

forslowe: delay. attache: seize. 3 prest: immediately. 4 plumes: wings. 5 hardinesse: boldness. 6 walke at large: move freely.

discharge: justify. snaky-wreathed Mace: Mercury’s mace, which has the power to summon both living and dead. 9 lower: scowl. 10 Hermes: Mercury.

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It did them all exceedingly amate,1 Save Jove; who, changing nought his count’nance bold, Did unto them at length these speeches wise unfold; 20 “Harken to mee awhile yee heavenly Powers; Ye may remember since th’Earths cursed seed2 Sought to assaile the heavens eternall towers, And to us all exceeding feare did breed: But how we then defeated all their deed, Yee all doe knowe, and them destroied quite; Yet not so quite, but that there did succeed An off-spring of their bloud, which did alite Upon the fruitfull earth, which doth us yet despite.3 21 “Of that bad seed is this bold woman bred, That now with bold presumption doth aspire To thrust faire Phoebe4 from her silver bed, And eke our selves from heavens high Empire, If that her might were match to her desire: Wherefore, it now behoves us to advise5 What way is best to drive her to retire; Whether by open force, or counsell wise, Areed6 ye sonnes of God, as best ye can devise.” 22 So having said, he ceast; and with his brow (His black eye-brow, whose doomefull dreaded beck7 Is wont to wield the world unto his vow,8 And even the highest Powers of heaven to check) Made signe to them in their degrees to speake: Who straight gan cast their counsell grave and wise. Meane-while, th’Earths daughter, thogh she nought did reck Of Hermes message; yet gan now advise, What course were best to take in this hot bold emprize.

1

5

2

6

amate: amaze. th’Earths cursed seed: the giants, Titans. 3 despite: anger. 4 Phoebe: Cynthia.

advise: consider. Areed: counsel. 7 beck: nod. 8 wield: control; vow: will.

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23 Eftsoones she thus resolv’d; that whil’st the Gods (After returne of Hermes Embassie) Were troubled, and amongst themselves at ods, Before they could new counsels re-allie,1 To set upon them in that extasie;2 And take what fortune time and place would lend: So, forth she rose, and through the purest sky To Joves high Palace straight cast to ascend, To prosecute her plot: Good on-set boads good end. 24 Shee there arriving, boldly in did pass; Where all the Gods she found in counsell close, All quite unarm’d, as then their manner was. At sight of her they suddaine all arose, In great amaze, ne wist what way to chose. But Jove, all fearelesse, forc’t them to aby;3 And in his soveraine throne, gan straight dispose Himselfe more full of grace and Majestie, That mote encheare his friends, and foes mote terrifie. 25 That, when the haughty Titanesse beheld, All were she fraught with pride and impudence, Yet with the sight thereof was almost queld; And inly quaking, seem’d as reft4 of sense, And voyd of speech in that drad audience; Untill that Jove himselfe, her selfe bespake: “Speake thou fraile woman, speake with confidence, Whence art thou, and what doost thou here now make?5 What idle errand hast thou, earths mansion to forsake?” 26 Shee, halfe confused with his great commaund, Yet gathering spirit of her natures pride, Him boldly answer’d thus to his demaund: “I am a daughter, by the mothers side, Of her that is Grand-mother magnifide6 Of all the Gods, great Earth, great Chaos child:

1

4

2

5

re-allie: regroup, form again. extasie: implies confusion as well as an exalted state of mystical bliss. 3 aby: stay.

reft: deprived. make: want. 6 magnifide: valued, praised.

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But by the fathers (be it not envide)1 I greater am in bloud (whereon I build) Then all the Gods, though wrongfully from heaven exil’d. 27 “For, Titan (as ye all acknowledge must) Was Saturnes elder brother by birth-right; Both, sonnes of Uranus:2 but by unjust And guilefull meanes, through Corybantes3 slight, The younger thrust the elder from his right: Since which, thou Jove, injuriously hast held The Heavens rule from Titans sonnes by might; And them to hellish dungeons downe hast feld: Witnesse ye Heavens the truth of all that I have teld.” 28 Whil’st she thus spake, the Gods that gave good eare To her bold words, and marked well her grace, Beeing of stature tall as any there Of all the Gods, and beautifull of face, As any of the Goddesses in place,4 Stood all astonied, like a sort5 of Steeres; Mongst whom, some beast of strange and forraine race, Unwares is chaunc’t, far straying from his peeres: So did their ghastly gaze bewray their hidden feares. 29 Till having pauz’d awhile, Jove thus bespake; “Will never mortall thoughts6 ceasse to aspire, In this bold sort, to Heaven claime to make, And touch celestiall seates with earthly mire? I would have thought, that bold Procrustes hire,7 Or Typhons fall, or proud Ixions8 paine,

1

envide: begrudged. Accounts of the exact relationship between Saturn and Titan vary, but Spenser’s version has precedents in collections of myths current in sixteenth-century England. 3 Corybantes: priests of the goddess, Cybele, who protected the infant Jove. They became notorious for their wild rituals. 2

4

in place: present. sort: herd. 6 mortall thoughts: as a Titan, Mutabilitie is part god, part mortal. Jove addresses her as if she were a lower form of life. 7 Procrustes: a son of Poseidon, beheaded by Theseus; hire: reward (punishment). 8 Typhons: see 15.8.n.; Ixions: bound to a fiery wheel in Hell by Jove for his crimes. 5

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Or great Prometheus,1 tasting of our ire, Would have suffiz’d, the rest for to restraine; And warn’d all men by their example to refraine: 30 “But now, this off-scum of that cursed fry,2 Dare to renew the like bold enterprize, And chalenge th’heritage of this our skie; Whom what should hinder, but that we likewise Should handle as the rest of her allies, And thunder-drive to hell?” With that, he shooke His Nectar-deawed locks, with which the skyes And all the world beneath for terror quooke, And eft his burning levin-brond3 in hand he tooke. 31 But, when he looked on her lovely face, In which, faire beames of beauty did appeare, That could the greatest wrath soone turne to grace (Such sway doth beauty even in Heaven beare) He staide his hand: and having chang’d his cheare, He thus againe in milder wise began; “But ah! if Gods should strive with flesh yfere,4 Then shortly should the progeny of Man Be rooted out, if Jove should doe still what he can: 32 “But thee faire Titans child, I rather weene, Through some vaine errour or inducement light,5 To see that mortall eyes have never seene; Or through ensample of thy sisters might, Bellona; whose great glory thou doost spight, Since thou hast seene her dreadfull power belowe, Mongst wretched men (dismaide with her affright)6 To bandie Crownes, and Kingdomes to bestowe: And sure thy worth, no lesse then hers doth seem to showe.

1

Prometheus: a Titan who stole fire from the Gods and was punished by being chained to a rock and having his liver devoured by an eagle every day for eternity. 2 fry: brood.

3

eft: afterward; levin-brond: lightning bolt. 4 flesh yfere: against flesh. 5 inducement light: tempting promise of reward. 6 with her affright: frightened of her.

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33 “But wote1 thou this, thou hardy Titanesse, That not the worth of any living wight May challenge ought in Heavens interesse;2 Much lesse the Title of old Titans Right: For, we by Conquest of our soveraine might, And by eternall doome3 of Fates decree, Have wonne the Empire of the Heavens bright; Which to our selves we hold, and to whom wee Shall worthy deeme partakers of our blisse to bee. 34 “Then ceasse thy idle claime thou foolish gerle, And seeke by grace and goodnesse to obtaine That place from which by folly Titan fell; There-to thou maist perhaps, if so thou faine4 Have Jove thy gratious Lord and Soveraigne.”5 So, having said, she thus to him replide; “Ceasse Saturnes sonne,6 to seeke by proffers vaine Of idle hopes t’allure mee to thy side, For to betray my Right, before I have it tride.7 35 “But thee, ô Jove, no equall8 Judge I deeme Of my desert, or of my dewfull Right; That in thine owne behalfe maist partiall seeme: But to the highest him, that is behight9 Father of Gods and men by equall might; To weet, the God of Nature, I appeale.”10 There-at Jove wexed wroth, and in his spright Did inly grudge,11 yet did it well conceale; And bade Dan Phoebus Scribe her Appellation12 seale.

1

wote: know. interesse: interest. 3 doome: judgment. 4 faine: imagine. 5 Jove’s dismissive words assert that the best that Mutabilitie can hope for is to have Jove as her sovereign, so she would achieve more if she acceded to his will. 6 Saturnes sonne: asserting her prior right of succession as Titan’s daughter, and so 2

avoiding Jove’s claim to rule by right of conquest. 7 tride: tested. 8 equall: impartial. 9 behight: called. 10 Nature is androgynous and can be represented as male or female. 11 grudge: resent her claim. 12 Dan Phoebus: Mercury; Appellation: appeal.

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36 Eftsoones the time and place appointed were, Where all, both heavenly Powers, and earthly wights, Before great Natures presence should appeare, For triall of their Titles and best Rights: That was, to weet, upon the highest hights Of Arlo-hill (Who knowes not Arlo-hill?)1 That is the highest head (in all mens sights) Of my old father Mole,2 whom Shepheards quill Renowmed hath with hymnes fit for a rurall skill.3 37 And, were it not ill fitting for this file,4 To sing of hilles and woods, mongst warres and Knights, I would abate5 the sternenesse of my stile, Mongst these sterne stounds to mingle soft delights; And tell how Arlo through Dianaes spights (Beeing of old the best and fairest Hill That was in all this holy-Islands6 hights) Was made the most unpleasant, and most ill. Meane while, ô Clio, lend Calliope thy quill.7 38 Whylome, when IRELAND florished in fame Of wealths and goodnesse, far above the rest Of all that beare the British Islands name, The Gods then us’d (for pleasure and for rest) Oft to resort there-to, when seem’d them best: But none of all there-in more pleasure found,

1

Arlo-hill: Galtymore, the hill outside Spenser’s house at Kilcolman in Ireland. The question may well, of course, be ironic. See VI.x.16.4. 2 Mole: may refer to the entire range of mountains: the Galtys and the Ballyhoira. 3 The shepherd is presumably Spenser, who praised the Mole in Colin Clouts come home againe, lines 104 and 105. 4

file: thread, part of the story. abate: stop. This is an example of the rhetorical figure, occupatio, referring to when a writer does exactly what he or she claims not to be doing. 5

6

holy-Islands: Ireland was renowned as a land of saints and scholars in the early middle ages, but it was thought to be wild and barbarous by English observers in Spenser’s time. 7 Clio was the Muse of history and poetry; Calliope was the Muse of music, often considered the fairest of the three Muses. Spenser implies that his poem is going beyond its normal register to reach new heights. This may well be a reflection on the quality of the poetry, but also, more ironically, on the betrayal of Ireland that he is about to narrate.

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Then Cynthia; that is soveraine Queene profest Of woods and forrests, which therein abound, Sprinkled with wholsom waters, more then most on ground. 39 But mongst them all, as fittest for her game, Either for chace of beasts with hound or boawe,1 Or for to shroude in shade from Phoebus flame,2 Or bathe in fountaines that doe freshly flowe, Or from high hilles, or from the dales belowe, She chose this Arlo; where shee did resort With all her Nymphes enranged on a rowe, With whom the woody Gods did oft consort: For, with the Nymphes, the Satyres love to play and sport. 40 Amongst the which, there was a Nymph that hight3 Molanna; daughter of old father Mole,4 And sister unto Mulla,5 faire and bright: Unto whose bed false Bregog6 whylome stole, That Shepheard Colin7 dearely did condole, And made her lucklesse loves well knowne to be. But this Molanna, were she not so shole,8 Were no lesse faire and beautifull then shee: Yet as she is, a fairer flood may no man see. 41 For, first, she springs out of two marble Rocks, On which, a grove of Oakes high mounted growes, That as a girlond seemes to deck the locks Of som faire Bride, brought forth with pompous9 showes Out of her bowre, that many flowers strowes:10 So, through the flowry Dales she tumbling downe, 1

boawe: bow (and arrow). Phoebus flame: the sun. Phoebus was the sun god. 3 hight: was called. 4 Molanna: a river near Spenser’s house in Ireland, the Brehanna. Spenser animates the local topography in an Ovidian-style myth of transformation, which explains how natural features were once human; Mole: see 36.8.n. 5 Mulla: the name for the Awbeg River. 2

6 Bregog: the name could mean “deceitful.” The two tributaries combine and flow into the larger Blackwater. 7 Colin Clout. See VI.x and Colin Clouts come home againe. 8 shole: shallow. Spenser exploits a number of puns in this story: see that on “bed” in line 4. 9 pompous: magnificent. 10 strowes: scatters.

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Through many woods, and shady coverts flowes (That on each side her silver channell crowne) Till to the Plaine she come, whose Valleyes shee doth drowne. 42 In her sweet streames, Diana used oft (After her sweatie chace and toilesome play) To bathe her selfe; and after, on the soft And downy grasse, her dainty limbes to lay In covert shade, where none behold her may: For, much she hated sight of living eye. Foolish God Faunus,1 though full many a day He saw her clad, yet longed foolishly To see her naked mongst her Nymphes in privity.2 43 No way he found to compasse3 his desire, But to corrupt Molanna, this her maid, Her to discover4 for some secret hire: So, her with flattering words he first assaid;5 And after, pleasing gifts for her purvaid,6 Queene-apples, and red Cherries from the tree, With which he her allured and betraid, To tell what time he might her Lady see When she her selfe did bathe, that he might secret bee. 44 There-to hee promist, if shee would him pleasure With this small boone, to quit7 her with a better; To weet, that where-as shee had out of measure Long lov’d the Fanchin,8 who by nought did set her, That he would undertake, for this to get her To be his Love, and of him liked well: Besides all which, he vow’d to be her debter For many moe good turnes9 then he would tell; The least of which, this little pleasure should excell.

1

Faunus: a lecherous wood god. privity: secret. 3 compasse: circumscribe, i.e., satisfy. 4 discover: reveal. 5 assaid: tested. 2

6

purvaid: provided. quit: repay. 8 Fanchin: another stream, the Funsheon, which runs into Molanna. 9 Another pun. 7

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45 The simple maid did yield to him anone;1 And eft him placed where he close2 might view That never any saw, save onely one;3 Who, for his hire to so foole-hardy dew,4 Was of his hounds devour’d in Hunters hew.5 Tho, as her manner was on sunny day, Diana, with her Nymphes about her, drew To this sweet spring; where, doffing her array,6 She bath’d her lovely limbes, for Jove a likely pray.7 46 There Faunus saw that pleased much his eye, And made his hart to tickle8 in his brest, That for great joy of some-what he did spy, He could him not containe in silent rest; But breaking forth in laughter, loud profest His foolish thought. A foolish Faune indeed, That couldst not hold thy selfe so hidden blest, But wouldest needs thine owne conceit areed.9 Babblers unworthy been of so divine a meed.10 47 The Goddesse, all abashed with that noise, In haste forth started from the guilty brooke;11 And running straight where-as she heard his voice, Enclos’d the bush about, and there him tooke, Like darred Larke;12 not daring up to looke On her whose sight before so much he sought. Thence, forth they drew him by the hornes, and shooke Nigh all to peeces, that they left him nought; And then into the open light they forth him brought.

1

anone: at once. close: secretly. 3 A reference to the story of Actaeon, who saw Diana bathing naked while he was out hunting. He was transformed into a stag and killed by his own hounds. The story, told in Ovid’s Metamorphoses (III, 135–250), is a source for Spenser’s story of Faunus. 4 dew: due; i.e., fitting punishment for his transgression. 2

5

hew: form, shape.

6

doffing her array: taking her clothes off. In Greek mythology, Jove was notorious for his seductions and rapes, so he might even try to ravish the goddess of chastity. 8 tickle: thrill. 9 areed: reveal. 10 meed: reward. 11 guilty brooke: Molanna. 12 darred Larke: dazzled lark, referring to the practice of catching birds with a mirror. 7

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48 Like as an huswife, that with busie care Thinks of her Dairie to make wondrous gaine, Finding where-as some wicked beast unware That breakes into her Dayr’house, there doth draine Her creaming pannes, and frustrate all her paine; Hath in some snare or gin1 set close behind, Entrapped him, and caught into her traine,2 Then thinkes what punishment were best assign’d, And thousand deathes deviseth in her vengefull mind: 49 So did Diana and her maydens all Use silly Faunus, now within their baile:3 They mocke and scorne him, and him foule miscall;4 Some by the nose him pluckt, some by the taile, And by his goatish beard some did him haile: Yet he (poore soule) with patience all did beare; For, nought against their wils might countervaile: Ne ought he said what ever he did heare; But hanging downe his head, did like a Mome5 appeare. 50 At length, when they had flouted him their fill, They gan to cast6 what penaunce him to give. Some would have gelt him, but that same would spill7 The Wood-gods breed, which must for ever live: Others would through the river him have drive, And ducked deepe: but that seem’d penaunce light; But most agreed and did this sentence give, Him in Deares skin to clad; and in that plight,8 To hunt him with their hounds, him selfe save how hee might. 51 But Cynthia’s selfe, more angry then the rest, Thought not enough, to punish him in sport, And of her shame to make a gamesome jest; But gan examine him in straighter9 sort,

1

6

2

7

gin: trap. traine: snare. 3 baile: power, custody. 4 miscall: insult. 5 Mome: idiot.

cast: think, consider. gelt: castrated; spill: destroy, extinguish. 8 plight: state. 9 straighter: harsher.

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Which of her Nymphes, or other close consort,1 Him thither brought, and her to him betraid? He, much affeard, to her confessed short,2 That ’twas Molanna which her so bewraid. Then all attonce their hands upon Molanna laid. 52 But him (according as they had decreed) With a Deeres-skin they covered, and then chast With all their hounds that after him did speed; But he more speedy, from them fled more fast Then any Deere: so sore him dread aghast. They after follow’d all with shrill out-cry, Shouting as they the heavens would have brast:3 That all the woods and dales where he did flie, Did ring againe, and loud reeccho to the skie. 53 So they him follow’d till they weary were; When, back returning to Molann’ againe, They, by commaund’ment of Diana, there Her whelm’d4 with stones. Yet Faunus (for her paine) Of her beloved Fanchin did obtaine, That her he would receive unto his bed.5 So now her waves passe through a pleasant Plaine, Till with the Fanchin she her selfe doe wed, And (both combin’d) themselves in one faire river spred. 54 Nath’lesse, Diana, full of indignation, Thence-forth abandond her delicious brooke; In whose sweet streame, before that bad occasion, So much delight to bathe her limbes she tooke: Ne onely her, but also quite forsooke All those faire forrests about Arlo hid, And all that Mountaine, which doth over-looke The richest champian that may else be rid,6 And the faire Shure,7 in which are thousand Salmons bred.

1

consort: confidante. short: soon. 3 brast: burst. 4 whelm’d: overwhelmed. 2

5

bed: another pun. champian: open country; else be rid: seen everywhere. 7 Shure: the river Suir in Tipperary. 6

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55 Them all, and all that she so deare did way,1 Thence-forth she left; and parting from the place, There-on an heavy haplesse2 curse did lay, To weet, that Wolves, where she was wont to space,3 Should harbour’d be, and all those Woods deface, And Thieves should rob and spoile that Coast around. Since which, those Woods, and all that goodly Chase,4 Doth to this day with Wolves and Thieves abound: Which too-too true that lands in-dwellers since have found.5

1

way: weigh, value. haplesse: causing misery. 3 weet: know (meaning “that is to say”); space: walk. 4 Chase: hunting ground. 2

5 A description of desolation that echoes many descriptions of Ireland in the 1590s, including many in Spenser’s A View of the State of Ireland.

Canto Seven Pealing,1 from Jove, to Natur’s Bar, bold Alteration2 pleades Large3 Evidence: but Nature soone her righteous Doome areads.4

1

Ah! whither doost thou now thou greater Muse5 Me from these woods and pleasing forrests bring? And my fraile spirit (that dooth oft refuse This too high flight, unfit for her weake wing) Lift up aloft, to tell of heavens King (Thy soveraine Sire)6 his fortunate successe, And victory, in bigger noates to sing, Which he obtain’d against that Titanesse, That him of heavens Empire sought to dispossesse.7

2

Yet sith I needs must follow thy behest,8 Doe thou my weaker wit with skill inspire, Fit for this turne; and in my sable9 brest Kindle fresh sparks of that immortall fire, Which learned minds inflameth with desire Of heavenly things: for, who but thou alone, That art yborne of heaven and heavenly Sire, Can tell things doen in heaven so long ygone; So farre past memory of man that may be knowne.

3

Now, at the time that was before agreed, The Gods assembled all on Arlo hill; As well those that are sprung of heavenly seed,

1

Pealing: appealing. Alteration: Mutabilitie. 3 Large: significant. 4 areads: proclaims. 5 greater Muse: Calliope (see vi.37.9). 6 soveraine Sire: Jove. 7 The reader is told the outcome before the trial starts. But the full force of the poem 2

may not lead us to conclude that Jove’s argument should defeat Mutabilitie’s. The poet suggests as much at viii.1. 8

behest: command. turne: task; sable: black, in mourning garments. J. C. Smith emended this to “feeble breast,” which has generally been accepted.

9

203

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As those that all the other world1 doe fill, And rule both sea and land unto their will: Onely th’infernall Powers might not appeare; Aswell for horror of their count’naunce ill,2 As for th’unruly fiends which they did feare; Yet Pluto and Proserpina3 were present there. 4

And thither also came all other creatures, What-ever life or motion doe retaine, According to their sundry kinds of features; That Arlo scarsly could them all containe; So full they filled every hill and Plaine: And had not Natures Sergeant (that is Order) Them well disposed by his busie paine,4 And raunged farre abroad in every border, They would have caused much confusion and disorder.

5

Then forth issewed (great goddesse) great dame Nature, With goodly port5 and gracious Majesty; Being far greater and more tall of stature Then any of the gods or Powers on hie: Yet certes by her face and physnomy,6 Whether she man or woman inly were, That could not any creature well descry: For, with a veile that wimpled7 every where, Her head and face was hid, that mote to none appeare.

6

That some doe say was so by skill devized, To hide the terror of her uncouth hew,8 From mortall eyes that should be sore agrized;9 For that her face did like a Lion shew, That eye of wight could not indure to view: But others tell that it so beautious was,

1

5

2

6

other world: the earth. count’naunce ill: ugly faces. 3 Pluto and Proserpina: the god and goddess who ruled the Underworld. 4 busie paine: strenuous efforts.

port: bearing. physnomy: appearance, countenance. 7 wimpled: covered. 8 uncouth hew: unusual form. 9 agrized: terrified.

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And round about such beames of splendor threw, That it the Sunne a thousand times did pass, Ne could be seene, but like an image in a glass.1 7

That well may seemen true: for, well I weene That this same day, when she on Arlo sat, Her garment was so bright and wondrous sheene,2 That my fraile wit cannot devize to what It to compare, nor finde like stuffe to that, As those three sacred Saints, though else most wise, Yet on mount Thabor3 quite their wits forgat, When they their glorious Lord in strange disguise Transfigur’d sawe; his garments so did daze their eyes.

8

In a fayre Plaine upon an equall4 Hill, She placed was in a pavilion; Not such as Craftes-men by their idle skill Are wont for Princes states to fashion: But th’earth her self of her owne motion, Out of her fruitfull bosome made to growe Most dainty trees; that, shooting up anon,5 Did seeme to bow their bloosming heads full lowe, For homage unto her, and like a throne did shew.

9

So hard it is for any living wight, All her array and vestiments to tell, That old Dan Geffrey6 (in whose gentle spright The pure well head of Poesie did dwell) In his Foules parley durst not with it mel,7

1 She can only be seen as a reflection, as she is too wonderful for humans to contemplate. The lines recall biblical descriptions of the difficulty of seeing God or the truth: “for now we see as through a glasse darkely” (1 Cor. 13.12), as well as Platonic theories of the ideal forms that can only be witnessed on earth like shadows in a cave. 2

sheene: beautiful, shining; continuing the image of the mirror. 3 Thabor: Peter, James, and John, the saints from the previous line, witnessed the transfiguration of Jesus on Mount Tabor, when

his face was seen to “shine as the sunne” (Matt. 17.2). 4 equall: flat topped. 5 anon: immediately. 6 Dan Geffrey: Geoffrey Chaucer, the greatest English poet before Spenser. Spenser acknowledges that he is using Chaucer’s Parliament of Fowls, a dream vision in which the birds all meet on a hill on Saint Valentine’s Day to debate the nature of love. 7 mel: meddle, interfere.

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But it transferd to Alane, who he thought Had in his Plaint of kindes1 describ’d it well: Which who will read set forth so as it ought, Go seek he out that Alane where he may be sought. 10 And all the earth far underneath her feete Was dight2 with flowres, that voluntary grew Out of the ground, and sent forth odours sweet, Tenne thousand mores3 of sundry sent and hew, That might delight the smell, or please the view: The which, the Nymphes, from all the brooks thereby Had gathered, which they at her foot-stoole threw; That richer seem’d then any tapestry, That Princes bowres adorne with painted imagery.4 11 And Mole himselfe, to honour her the more, Did deck himself in freshest faire attire, And his high head, that seemeth alwaies hore5 With hardned frosts of former winters ire, He with an Oaken girlond now did tire, As if the love of some new Nymph late seene, Had in him kindled youthfull fresh desire, And made him change his gray attire to greene; Ah gentle Mole! such joyance hath thee well beseene.6 12 Was never so great joyance since the day, That all the gods whylome assembled were, On Haemus hill in their divine array, To celebrate the solemne7 bridall cheare, Twixt Peleus, and dame Thetis pointed8 there; Where Phoebus self, that god of Poets hight,

1

Plaint of kindes: a reference to Alanus de Insulis’ The Complaint of Nature, translated as The Plaint of Kind in a Middle English version, which Spenser may have seen in manuscript or may simply have known of through reading Chaucer. 2 dight: decked. 3 mores: roots.

4

Nature is shown to go beyond culture. The subject was frequently debated in treatises on art and poetry at the time. 5 hore: white. 6 hath thee well beseene: suits you. 7 solemne: sacred. 8 pointed: appointed.

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They say did sing the spousall hymne full cleere, That all the gods were ravisht with delight Of his celestiall song, and Musicks wondrous might.1 13 This great Grandmother of all creatures bred Great Nature, ever young yet full of eld,2 Still mooving, yet unmoved from her sted;3 Unseene of any, yet of all beheld; Thus sitting in her throne as I have teld, Before her came dame Mutabilitie; And being lowe before her presence feld, With meek obaysance4 and humilitie, Thus gan her plaintif Plea, with words to amplifie; 14 “To thee ô greatest goddesse, onely great, An humble suppliant loe, I lowely fly Seeking for Right, which I of thee entreat; Who Right to all dost deale indifferently,5 Damning all Wrong and tortious6 Injurie, Which any of thy creatures doe to other (Oppressing them with power, unequally) Sith of them all thou art the equall mother, And knittest each to’each, as brother unto brother. 15 “To thee therefore of this same Jove I plaine,7 And of his fellow gods that faine8 to be, That challenge9 to themselves the whole worlds raign; Of which, the greatest part is due to me, And heaven it selfe by heritage in Fee:10 For, heaven and earth I both alike do deeme,

1

The stanza refers to the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, at which Ate, the goddess of discord, threw down a golden apple, a wedding gift that was to cause a serious quarrel among the three goddesses, Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite. 2 eld: age, implying wisdom. 3 sted: place.

4

obaysance: obeisance, submission. indifferently: impartially. 6 tortious: wicked, liable to prosecution. 7 plaine: complain. 8 faine: pretend. 9 challenge: claim. 10 Fee: possession (a legal term indicating absolute ownership). 5

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Sith heaven and earth are both alike to thee; And, gods no more then men thou doest esteeme: For, even the gods to thee, as men to gods do seeme.1 16 “Then weigh, ô soveraigne goddesse, by what right These gods do claime the worlds whole soverainty; And that2 is onely dew unto thy might Arrogate to themselves ambitiously: As for the gods owne principality,3 Which Jove usurpes unjustly; that to be My heritage, Jove’s self cannot deny, From my great Grandsire Titan, unto mee, Deriv’d by dew descent; as is well knowen to thee. 17 “Yet mauger4 Jove, and all his gods beside, I doe possesse the worlds most regiment;5 As, if ye please it into parts divide,6 And every parts inholders7 to convent, Shall to your eyes appeare incontinent.8 And first, the Earth (great mother of us all) That only seems unmov’d and permanent, And unto Mutability not thrall; Yet is she chang’d in part, and eeke in generall. 18 “For, all that from her springs, and is ybredde, How-ever fayre it flourish for a time, Yet see we soone decay; and, being dead, To turne again unto their earthly slime: Yet, out of their decay and mortall crime,9 We daily see new creatures to arize; And of their Winter spring another Prime,10 Unlike in forme, and chang’d by strange disguise: So turne they still about, and change in restlesse wise. 1

Mutabilitie seeks to break down barriers and abolish rank and order. This argument may seem more appealing to a contemporary audience than it would have to one in the late 1590s. Here the revolutionary politics of Mutabilitie’s challenge become clear. 2 that: that which. 3 principality: sovereignty. 4 mauger: despite.

5

I.e., I rule over most of the world. Over the next nine stanzas, Mutabilitie touches upon the four elements: earth, water, air, and fire. 7 inholders: inhabitants. 8 incontinent: immediately. 9 crime: corruption. 10 Prime: spring. 6

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19 “As for her tenants;1 that is, man and beasts, The beasts we daily see massacred dy, As thralls and vassalls unto mens beheasts:2 And men themselves doe change continually, From youth to eld, from wealth to poverty, From good to bad, from bad to worst of all. Ne doe their bodies only flit and fly: But eeke their minds (which they immortall call) Still change and vary thoughts, as new occasions fall. 20 “Ne is the water in more constant case; Whether those same on high, or these belowe. For, th’Ocean moveth stil, from place to place; And every River still doth ebbe and flowe: Ne any Lake, that seems most still and slowe, Ne Poole so small, that can his smoothnesse holde, When any winde doth under heaven blowe; With which, the clouds are also tost and roll’d; Now like great Hills; and, streight, like sluces,3 them unfold. 21 “So likewise are all watry living wights4 Still tost, and turned, with continuall change, Never abyding in their stedfast plights.5 The fish, still floting,6 doe at randon range, And never rest; but evermore exchange Their dwelling places, as the streames them carrie: Ne have the watry foules a certaine grange,7 Wherein to rest, ne in one stead do tarry; But flitting still doe flie, and still their places vary. 22 “Next is the Ayre: which who feeles not by sense (For, of all sense it is the middle meane)8 To flit still? and, with subtill influence Of his thin spirit, all creatures to maintaine, 1

Mutabilitie frames her own claim in terms of permanent possession and reminds Nature that people are only temporary lodgers, tenants, in her world. 2 beheasts: commands. 3 sluces: floodgates.

4

watry living wights: creatures who live in water. 5 plights: conditions. 6 still floting: always swimming. 7 certaine grange: secure home. 8 I.e., air stands between earth and heaven as the middle element.

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In state of life? O weake life! that does leane On thing so tickle1 as th’unsteady ayre; Which every howre is chang’d, and altred cleane With every blast that bloweth fowle or faire: The faire doth it prolong; the fowle doth it impaire. 23 “Therein the changes infinite beholde, Which to her creatures every minute chaunce; Now, boyling hot: streight, friezing deadly cold: Now, faire sun-shine, that makes all skip and daunce: Streight, bitter storms and balefull countenance,2 That makes them all to shiver and to shake: Rayne, hayle, and snowe do pay them sad penance,3 And dreadfull thunder-claps (that make them quake) With flames and flashing lights that thousand changes make. 24 “Last is the fire: which, though it live for ever, Ne can be quenched quite; yet, every day, Wee see his parts, so soone as they do sever, To lose their heat, and shortly to decay; So, makes himself his owne consuming pray.4 Ne any living creatures doth he breed: But all, that are of others bredd, doth slay; And, with their death, his cruell life dooth feed; Nought leaving, but their barren ashes, without seede. 25 “Thus, all these fower (the which the ground-work bee Of all the world, and of all living wights) To thousand sorts of Change we subject see: Yet are they chang’d (by other wondrous slights)5 Into themselves, and lose their native mights;6 The Fire to Aire, and th’Ayre to Water sheere,7 And Water into Earth: yet Water fights With Fire, and Aire with Earth approaching neere: Yet all are in one body, and as one appeare.

1

4

2

5

tickle: fickle, untrustworthy. Streight: hard; balefull countenance: deadly cold fronts. 3 Mutabilitie reminds Nature that the seasons punish mankind in the fallen world.

Fire consumes itself. slights: devices. 6 Into themselves: into each other; mights: character, power. 7 sheere: bright, clear.

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26 “So, in them all raignes Mutabilitie; How-ever these, that Gods themselves do call, Of them doe claime the rule and soverainty: As, Vesta,1 of the fire æthereall; Vulcan,2 of this, with us so usuall; Ops, of the earth; and Juno3 of the Ayre; Neptune, of Seas; and Nymphes, of Rivers all. For, all those Rivers to me subject are: And all the rest, which they usurp, be all my share. 27 “Which to approven4 true, as I have told, Vouchsafe, ô goddesse, to thy presence call The rest which doe the world in being hold: As, times and seasons of the yeare that fall: Of all the which, demand in generall, Or judge thy selfe, by verdit5 of thine eye, Whether to me they are not subject all.” Nature did yeeld thereto; and by-and-by, Bade Order call them all, before her Majesty. 28 So, forth issew’d the Seasons of the yeare;6 First, lusty Spring, all dight in leaves of flowres That freshly budded and new bloosmes did beare (In which a thousand birds had built their bowres That sweetly sung, to call forth Paramours): And in his hand a javelin he did beare, And on his head (as fit for warlike stoures)7 A guilt engraven morion8 he did weare; That as some did him love, so others did him feare. 29 Then came the jolly Sommer, being dight In a thin silken cassock9 coloured greene, That was unlyned all, to be more light: And on his head a girlond well beseene 1

Vesta: goddess of the hearth and domestic fires. 2 Vulcan: god of fire. 3 Ops: goddess of the earth; Juno: queen of the gods, goddess of the air, and wife of Jove. 4 approven: prove.

5

verdit: verdict, judgment. Jove introduced the seasons when Saturn was overthrown. 7 stoures: conflicts. 8 morion: helmet. 9 cassock: tunic. 6

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He wore, from which as he had chauffed1 been The sweat did drop; and in his hand he bore A boawe and shaftes,2 as he in forrest greene Had hunted late the Libbard3 or the Bore, And now would bathe his limbes, with labor heated sore. 30 Then came the Autumne all in yellow clad, As though he joyed in his plentious store, Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad That he had banisht hunger, which to-fore4 Had by the belly oft him pinched sore. Upon his head a wreath that was enrold With eares of corne, of every sort he bore: And in his hand a sickle he did holde, To reape the ripened fruits the which the earth had yold.5 31 Lastly, came Winter cloathed all in frize,6 Chattering his teeth for cold that did him chill, Whil’st on his hoary beard his breath did freese; And the dull drops that from his purpled bill7 As from a limbeck8 did adown distill. In his right hand a tipped staffe he held, With which his feeble steps he stayed still: For, he was faint with cold, and weak with eld; That scarse his loosed limbes he hable was to weld.9 32 These, marching softly,10 thus in order went, And after them, the Monthes all riding came; First,11 sturdy March with brows full sternly bent, And armed strongly, rode upon a Ram,12

1

chauffed: heated, rubbed. boawe and shaftes: bow and arrows. 3 Libbard: leopard. 4 to-fore: before. 5 yold: yielded. 6 frize: coarse woollen cloth. 7 bill: nose. 8 limbeck: the rim of an alchemist’s distilling equipment. Undoubtedly a joke about 2

the unsavory and bogus practices of alchemists. 9 loosed: weak; weld: move. 10 softly: slowly. 11 First: because the new year began in March. Spenser now mentions the twelve signs of the zodiac, one for each month, linking them to classical myths. 12 armed strongly: as the month of Mars, god of war, suggests; Ram: Aries.

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The same which over Hellespontus 1 swam: Yet in his hand a spade he also hent,2 And in a bag all sorts of seeds ysame,3 Which on the earth he strowed as he went, And fild her womb with fruitfull hope of nourishment. 33 Next came fresh Aprill full of lustyhed, And wanton as a Kid whose horne new buds: Upon a Bull4 he rode, the same which led Europa floting through th’Argolick fluds:5 His hornes were gilden all with golden studs And garnished with garlonds goodly dight Of all the fairest flowres and freshest buds Which th’earth brings forth, and wet he seem’d in sight With waves, through which he waded for his loves delight. 34 Then came faire May, the fayrest mayd on ground, Deckt all with dainties of her seasons pryde, And throwing flowres out of her lap around: Upon two brethrens shoulders she did ride, The twinnes of Leda;6 which on eyther side Supported her like to their soveraine Queene. Lord! how all creatures laught, when her they spide, And leapt and daunc’t as they had ravisht beene! And Cupid selfe about her fluttred all in greene. 35 And after her, came jolly June, arrayd All in greene leaves, as he a Player7 were; Yet in his time, he wrought as well as playd, That by his plough-yrons mote right well appeare: Upon a Crab8 he rode, that him did beare With crooked crawling steps an uncouth pase,

1

Hellespontus: the dangerous straits in the Dardinelles, named when Jove took Helle away from her stepmother on a ram, before she unfortunately fell into the water.

2

hent: held. 3 ysame: together. 4 Bull: Taurus.

5

Argolick fluds: the waters of the Argolic Gulf. Jove carried Europa over the sea disguised as a bull. 6

Leda: Castor and Pollux, making up the zodiacal sign of Gemini. Jove seduced Leda while disguised as a swan. 7 Player: actor. 8 Crab: the zodiacal sign of Cancer.

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And backward yode,1 as Bargemen wont to fare Bending their force contrary to their face, Like that ungracious crew which faines demurest grace.2 36 Then came hot July boyling like to fire, That all his garments he had cast away: Upon a Lyon3 raging yet with ire He boldly rode and made him to obay: It was the beast that whylome did forray The Nemaean forrest, till th’Amphytrionide Him slew, and with his hide did him array;4 Behinde his back a sithe, and by his side Under his belt he bore a sickle circling wide. 37 The sixt was August, being rich arrayd In garment all of gold downe to the ground: Yet rode he not, but led a lovely Mayd Forth by the lilly hand, the which was cround With eares of corne, and full her hand was found; That was the righteous Virgin, which of old Liv’d here on earth, and plenty made abound;5 But, after Wrong was lov’d and Justice solde, She left th’unrighteous world and was to heaven extold.6 38 Next him, September marched eeke on foote; Yet was he heavy laden with the spoyle Of harvests riches, which he made his boot,7 And him enricht with bounty of the soyle: In his one hand, as fit for harvests toyle, He held a knife-hook; and in th’other hand A paire of waights, with which he did assoyle8 Both more and lesse, where it in doubt did stand, And equall gave to each as Justice duly scann’d.9 1 2

yode: went.

I.e., like that ungracious group who pretend to be gracious but are really the opposite. 3 Leo. 4 Hercules, who was thought to be the son of Amphitryon, slew the Nemaean Lion as the first of his twelve labors.

5

Astrea, goddess of Justice, here cast as Virgo.

6

extold: raised. Spenser tells this story at V.i.11. 7 boot: booty. 8 waights: for a scale, making him the sign Libra; assoyle: worked out. 9 scann’d: judged.

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39 Then came October full of merry glee: For, yet his noule was totty of the must,1 Which he was treading in the wine-fats see,2 And of the joyous oyle, whose gentle gust3 Made him so frollick and so full of lust: Upon a dreadfull Scorpion he did ride, The same which by Dianaes doom unjust Slew great Orion:4 and eeke by his side He had his ploughing share, and coulter5 ready tyde. 40 Next was November, he full grosse and fat, As fed with lard, and that right well might seeme; For, he had been a fatting hogs of late, That yet his browes with sweat, did reek and steem, And yet the season was full sharp and breem;6 In planting eeke he took no small delight: Whereon he rode, not easie was to deeme; For it a dreadfull Centaure was in sight, The seed of Saturne, and faire Nais, Chiron hight.7 41 And after him, came next the chill December: Yet he through merry feasting which he made, And great bonfires, did not the cold remember; His Saviours birth his mind so much did glad: Upon a shaggy-bearded Goat he rode, The same wherewith Dan Jove in tender yeares, They say, was nourisht by th’Idaean mayd;8 And in his hand a broad deepe boawle9 he beares; Of which, he freely drinks an health to all his peeres.

1

I.e., he was always drunk with new wine. wine-fats see: the sea of wine in vats. 3 gust: taste. 4 Diana sent a scorpion to kill Orion when he claimed that he was a match for any earthly creature. The scorpion represents Scorpio. 5 coulter: ploughing blade. 2

6

breem: cold, harsh. Chiron, the son of Saturn and the water nymph Nais, was a centaur. He was also an archer, making him Sagittarius. 8 December’s sign is Capricorn, the goat. Jove was fed by a goat when he was looked after by Amalthea, the Idaean maid who lived on Mount Ida. 9 boawle: bowl. 7

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42 Then came old January, wrapped well In many weeds to keep the cold away; Yet did he quake and quiver like to quell,1 And blowe his nayles to warme them if he may: For, they were numbd with holding all the day An hatchet keene, with which he felled wood, And from the trees did lop the needlesse spray:2 Upon an huge great Earth-pot steane3 he stood; From whose wide mouth, there flowed forth the Romane floud. 43 And lastly, came cold February, sitting In an old wagon, for he could not ride; Drawne of two fishes4 for the season fitting, Which through the flood before did softly slyde And swim away: yet had he by his side His plough and harnesse fit to till the ground, And tooles to prune the trees, before the pride Of hasting Prime did make them burgein5 round: So past the twelve Months forth, and their dew places found. 44 And after these, there came the Day, and Night, Riding together both with equall pase, Th’one on a Palfrey blacke, the other white; But Night had covered her uncomely face With a blacke veile, and held in hand a mace, On top whereof the moon and stars were pight,6 And sleep and darknesse round about did trace: But Day did beare, upon his scepters hight, The goodly Sun, encompast all with beames bright. 45 Then came the Howres, faire daughters of high Jove, And timely Night, the which were all endewed With wondrous beauty fit to kindle love; But they were Virgins all, and love eschewed, That might forslack the charge to them fore-shewed7 By mighty Jove; who did them Porters make 1

quell: die. spray: branch. 3 steane: jar, hence the sign of Aquarius. 4 two fishes: making the sign Pisces. 2

5

Prime: spring; burgein: bud. pight: placed. 7 forslack: neglect; fore-shewed: ordained. 6

Canto Seven

Of heavens gate (whence all the gods issued) Which they did dayly watch, and nightly wake By even turnes, ne ever did their charge forsake. 46 And after all came Life, and lastly Death; Death with most grim and griesly visage seene, Yet is he nought but parting of the breath; Ne ought to see, but like a shade to weene, Unbodied, unsoul’d, unheard, unseene.1 But Life was like a faire young lusty boy, Such as they faine Dan Cupid to have beene, Full of delightfull health and lively joy, Deckt all with flowres, and wings of gold fit to employ. 47 When these were past, thus gan the Titanesse; “Lo, mighty mother, now be judge and say, Whether in all thy creatures more or lesse CHANGE doth not raign and beare the greatest sway: For, who sees not, that Time on all doth pray? But Times do change and move continually. So nothing here long standeth in one stay: Wherefore, this lower world who can deny But to be subject still to Mutabilitie?” 48 Then thus gan Jove; “Right true it is, that these And all things else that under heaven dwell Are chaung’d of Time, who doth them all disseise2 Of being: But, who is it (to me tell) That Time himselfe doth move and still compell To keepe his course? Is not that namely wee Which poure that vertue from our heavenly cell, That moves them all, and makes them changed be? So them we gods doe rule, and in them also thee.” 49 To whom, thus Mutability: “The things Which we see not how they are mov’d and swayd, Ye may attribute to your selves as Kings, And say they by your secret powre are made:

1

Cf. Milton’s Death, Paradise Lost, 2.666 ff.

2

disseise: deprive, dispossess.

217

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But what we see not, who shall us perswade?1 But were they so, as ye them faine2 to be, Mov’d by your might, and ordred by your ayde; Yet what if I can prove, that even yee Your selves are likewise chang’d, and subject unto mee? 50 “And first, concerning her that is the first, Even you faire Cynthia, whom so much ye make Joves dearest darling, she was bred and nurst On Cynthus hill,3 whence she her name did take: Then is she mortall borne, how-so ye crake;4 Besides, her face and countenance every day We changed see, and sundry forms partake, Now hornd, now round, now bright, now brown and gray: So that as changefull as the Moone men use to say.5 51 “Next, Mercury, who though he lesse appeare To change his hew, and alwayes seeme as one; Yet, he his course doth altar every yeare, And is of late far out of order gone: So Venus eeke, that goodly Paragone, Though faire all night, yet is she darke all day; And Phoebus self, who lightsome is alone, Yet is he oft eclipsed by the way, And fills the darkned world with terror and dismay. 52 “Now Mars that valiant man is changed most: For, he some times so far runs out of square, That he his way doth seem quite to have lost, And cleane without6 his usuall sphere to fare;

1 Mutabilitie gives voice to a powerfully skeptical argument, which can be subversive of traditional astronomy, kingship, and religion. She proceeds to portray the Gods, not as divinities, but merely as planets. Furthermore, they are susceptible to the vicissitudes that were leading, in Spenser’s day, to the reevaluation of the geocentric theory of the universe in favor of Copernicus’ heliocentric theory. 2 faine: wish, desire.

3 Cynthus hill: the hill in Delios where Diana was born. 4 crake: boast. 5 This stanza is often read as a scathing attack on Elizabeth, who was now very old by Renaissance standards (she was sixty-five in 1598 when the cantos were probably written). She was often represented as notoriously capricious and fickle in the 1590s by her courtiers. 6 without: outside.

Canto Seven

219

That even these Star-gazers stonisht are At sight thereof, and damne their lying bookes: So likewise, grim Sir Saturne oft doth spare His sterne aspect, and calme his crabbed lookes: So many turning cranks these have, so many crookes.1 53 “But you Dan Jove, that only constant are, And King of all the rest, as ye do clame, Are you not subject eeke to this misfare?2 Then let me aske you this withouten blame, Where were ye borne? some say in Crete by name, Others in Thebes, and others other-where; But wheresoever they comment the same, They all consent that ye begotten were, And borne here in this world, ne other can appeare.3 54 “Then are ye mortall borne, and thrall to me, Unlesse the kingdome of the sky yee make Immortall, and unchangeable to bee; Besides, that power and vertue which ye spake,4 That ye here worke, doth many changes take, And your owne natures change: for, each of you That vertue have, or this, or that to make, Is checkt and changed from his nature trew, By others opposition or obliquid5 view. 55 “Besides, the sundry motions of your Spheares, So sundry waies and fashions as clerkes6 faine, Some in short space, and some in longer yeares; What is the same but alteration plaine? Onely the starrie skie doth still remaine: Yet do the Starres and Signes therein still move,

1

turning cranks: crookes: bends.

2

winding

paths;

misfare: misfortune. Because he was begotten in the world, Jove is mortal in essence and subject to the ravages of time. 4 The “power and virtue” of which Jove speaks are those mentioned in the claim at 3

48.6–8, “Is not that namely wee / Which poure that vertue from our heavenly cell, / That moves them all, and makes them changed be?” 5 obliquid: oblique (a neologism used only here). 6 clerkes: scholars.

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And even it self is mov’d, as wizards1 saine. But all that moveth, doth mutation love: Therefore both you and them to me I subject prove. 56 “Then since within this wide great Universe Nothing doth firme and permanent appeare, But all things tost and turned by transverse:2 What then should let, but I aloft should reare My Trophee, and from all, the triumph beare? Now judge then (ô thou greatest goddesse trew!) According as thy selfe doest see and heare, And unto me addoom3 that is my dew; That is the rule of all, all being rul’d by you.” 57 So having ended, silence long ensewed, Ne Nature to or fro4 spake for a space, But with firme eyes affixt, the ground still viewed. Meane while, all creatures, looking in her face, Expecting th’end of this so doubtfull case, Did hang in long suspence what would ensew, To whether5 side should fall the soveraigne place: At length, she looking up with chearefull view, The silence brake, and gave her doome in speeches few. 58 “I well consider all that ye have sayd, And find that all things stedfastnes doe hate And changed be: yet being rightly wayd6 They are not changed from their first estate; But by their change their being doe dilate:7 And turning to themselves at length againe, Doe worke their owne perfection so by fate: Then over them Change doth not rule and raigne; But they raigne over change, and doe their states maintaine.

1

Wizards were associated with the stars as astronomers and astrologers. 2 by transverse: awry. 3 addoom: judge. 4 to or fro: for or against. 5 whether: which.

6

wayd: judged. dilate: expand, enlarge upon, express themselves more fully. The language suggests that, even if Nature’s logic holds, everything is still subject to change. 7

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59 “Cease therefore daughter further to aspire, And thee content thus to be rul’d by me: For thy decay1 thou seekst by thy desire; But time shall come that all shall changed bee, And from thenceforth, none no more change shall see.” So was the Titaness put downe and whist,2 And Jove confirm’d in his imperiall see. Then was that whole assembly quite dismist, And Natur’s selfe did vanish, whither no man wist.

1

decay: downfall.

2

put downe: defeated; whist: silenced.

Canto Eight The VIII. Canto, vnperfite.1 1

When I bethinke me on that speech whyleare,2

Of Mutability, and well it way:3 Me seemes, that though she all unworthy were Of the Heav’ns Rule; yet very sooth to say, In all things else she beares the greatest sway. Which makes me loath this state of life so tickle,4 And love of things so vaine to cast away; Whose flowring pride, so fading and so fickle, Short Time shall soon cut down with his consuming sickle. 2

Then gin I thinke on that which Nature sayd, Of that same time when no more Change shall be, But stedfast rest of all things firmely stayd Upon the pillours of Eternity, That is contrayr to Mutabilitie: For, all that moveth, doth in Change delight: But thence-forth all shall rest eternally With Him that is the God of Sabbaoth5 hight: O! thou great Sabbaoth God, grant me that Sabaoths sight.

FINIS.

1 2 3

vnperfite: imperfect. whyleare: former.

way: weigh. tickle: fickle, inconstant. 5 God of Sabbaoth: a multiple pun. The description alludes to the God of final causes, the state of rest after the world has 4

ended, and the day of rest, the Sabbath, when God rested after creating the world. “Sabbaoth” is also near to the Hebrew for “Hosts,” from the Lord of Hosts, one of the Hebrew names for God, meaning the lord of great armies or numbers. The point is that the life God gives completes and circumscribes everything.

222

THE LETTER TO RALEIGH A Letter of the Authors expounding his whole intention in the course of this worke: which for that it giueth great light to the Reader, for the better vnderstanding is hereunto annexed.

To the Right noble, and Valorous, Sir Walter Raleigh knight, Lo. Wardein of the Stanneryes, and her Maiesties liefetenaunt of the County of Cornewayll.1 Sir knowing how doubtfully all Allegories may be construed, and this booke of mine, which I have entituled the Faery Queene, being a continued Allegory, or darke conceit, I have thought good aswell for avoyding of gealous opinions and misconstructions, as also for your better light in reading thereof, (being so by you commanded,) to discover unto you the general intention and meaning, which in the whole course thereof I have fashioned, without expressing of any particular purposes or by accidents therein occasioned.The generall end therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in vertuous and gentle discipline:2 Which for that I conceived shoulde be most plausible3 and pleasing, being coloured with an historicall fiction, the which the most part of men delight to read, rather for variety of matter, then for profite of the ensample: I chose the historye of king Arthure, as most fitte for the excellency of his person, being made famous by many mens former workes, and also furthest from the daunger of envy, and suspition of present time. In which I have followed all the antique Poets historicall, first Homere, who in the Persons of Agamemnon and Ulysses hath ensampled a good governour and a vertuous man, the one in his Ilias, the other in his Odysseis: then Virgil, whose like intention was to doe in the person of Aeneas: after him Ariosto comprised them 1

Appended to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene, Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh,” also called “A Letter of the Authors,” has been read as a preface, detailing both the larger plot and the poetics underlying the poem. It was not included in the 1596 edi-

tion, and so only discusses the first three books directly. 2 discipline: learning, training, orderly conduct, the system by which a church exercises control over its members. 3 plausible: deserving applause, acceptable.

223

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both in his Orlando:1 and lately Tasso dissevered them againe, and formed both parts in two persons, namely that part which they in Philosophy call Ethice, or vertues of a private man, coloured in his Rinaldo:The other named Politice in his Godfredo.2 By ensample of which excellente Poets, I labour to pourtraict in Arthure, before he was king, the image of a brave knight, perfected in the twelve private morall vertues, as Aristotle hath devised,3 the which is the purpose of these first twelve bookes: which if I finde to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encoraged, to frame the other part of polliticke vertues in his person, after that hee came to be king.4 To some I know this Methode will seeme displeasaunt, which had rather have good discipline delivered plainly in way of precepts, or sermoned at large, as they use, then thus clowdily enwrapped in Allegoricall devises. But such, me seeme, should be satisfide with the use of these dayes seeing all things accounted by their showes, and nothing esteemed of, that is not delightfull and pleasing to commune sence. For this cause is Xenophon preferred before Plato, for that the one in the exquisite depth of his judgement, formed a Commune welth such as it should be, but the other in the person of Cyrus and the Persians fashioned a government such as might best be: So much more profitable and gratious is doctrine by ensample, then by rule.5 So have I laboured to doe in the person of Arthure: whome I conceive after his long education by Timon, to whom he was by Merlin delivered to be brought up, so soone as he was borne of the Lady Igrayne, to have seene in a dream or vision the Faery Queen, with whose excellent beauty ravished, he awaking resolved to seeke her out, and so being by Merlin armed, and by Timon throughly instructed, he went to seeke her forth in Faerye land. In that Faery Queene I meane glory in my generall intention, but in my particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our soveraine the Queene, and her kingdome in Faery land. And yet in some places els, I doe otherwise shadow her. For considering she beareth two persons, the one of a most royall Queene or Empresse, the other of a most vertuous and beautifull Lady, this latter part in some places I doe expresse in Belphoebe, fashioning her name according to your owne excellent conceipt of Cynthia, (Phoebe and Cynthia being both names of Diana).6 So in the person of 1

Lodovico Ariosto, Italian author of Orlando Furioso (1532). 2 Torquato Tasso, Italian author of Rinaldo (1562) and Gerusalemme Liberata (1581), in which the hero Godfredo embodies public or political virtues. 3 Aristotle does not name twelve particular moral virtues in the Nicomachaean Ethics. There are, however, several Medieval and Renaissance commentaries on Aristotle from which twelve could be construed. 4 Spenser indicates that he planned twelve books for The Faerie Queene and would

willingly write twenty-four, the former matching Virgil, the latter Homer. 5 Spenser says that Xenophon’s Cyropaedia, celebrated for teaching by example, is commonly preferred to Plato’s Republic, which taught by precepts. 6 Belphoebe appears in Books Two, Three, and Four. Cynthia refers to Raleigh’s poem of that name, which also celebrated Elizabeth. Spenser suggests that Gloriana, the Faerie Queen, represents Elizabeth’s public role as monarch, while Belphoebe personifies her private, virginal life.

The Letter to Raleigh

225

Prince Arthure I sette forth magnificence in particular, which vertue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is the perfection of all the rest, and conteineth in it them all, therefore in the whole course I mention the deedes of Arthure applyable to that vertue, which I write of in that booke. But of the xii. other vertues, I make xii. other knights the patrones, for the more variety of the history: Of which these three bookes contayn three.The first of the knight of the Redcrosse, in whome I expresse Holynes:The seconde of Sir Guyon, in whome I sette forth Temperaunce: The third of Britomartis a Lady knight, in whome I picture Chastity. But because the beginning of the whole worke seemeth abrupte and as depending upon other antecedents, it needs that ye know the occasion of these three knights severall adventures. For the Methode of a Poet historical is not such, as of an Historiographer. For an Historiographer discourseth of affayres orderly as they were donne, accounting as well the times as the actions, but a Poet thrusteth into the middest,1 even where it most concerneth him, and there recoursing to the thinges forepaste, and divining of thinges to come, maketh a pleasing Analysis of all.The beginning therefore of my history, if it were to be told by an Historiographer should be the twelfth booke, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queene kept her Annuall feaste xii. dayes, uppon which xii. severall dayes, the occasions of the xii. severall adventures hapned, which being undertaken by xii. severall knights, are in these xii books severally handled and discoursed.The first was this. In the beginning of the feast, there presented him selfe a tall clownishe 2 younge man, who falling before the Queen of Faries desired a boone (as the manner then was) which during that feast she might not refuse: which was that hee might have the atchievement of any adventure, which during that feaste should happen, that being graunted, he rested him on the floore, unfitte through his rusticity for a better place. Soone after entred a faire Ladye in mourning weedes, riding on a white Asse, with a dwarfe behind her leading a warlike steed, that bore the Armes of a knight, and his speare in the dwarfes hand. Shee falling before the Queene of Faeries, complayned that her father and mother an ancient King and Queene, had bene by an huge dragon many years shut up in a brasen3 Castle, who thence suffred them not to yssew: and therefore besought the Faery Queene to assygne her some one of her knights to take on him that exployt. Presently that clownish person upstarting, desired that adventure: whereat the Queene much wondering, and the Lady much gainesaying, yet he earnestly importuned his desire. In the end the Lady told him that unlesse that armour which she brought, would serve him (that is the armour of a Christian man specified by Saint Paul v. Ephes.4) that he could not succeed in that enterprise, which being forthwith put upon him with dewe furnitures5 thereunto, he seemed

1

4

2

5

See Horace, Ars Poetica, 146–52. clownishe: rustic. 3 brasen: strong like brass.

See Eph. 6.11–17. dewe furnitures: proper equipment.

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the goodliest man in al that company, and was well liked of the Lady. And eftesoones1 taking on him knighthood, and mounting on that straunge Courser, he went forth with her on that adventure: where beginneth the first booke, vz. A gentle knight was pricking on the playne. &c. The second day ther came in a Palmer bearing an Infant with bloody hands, whose Parents he complained to have bene slayn by an Enchaunteresse called Acrasia: and therfore craved of the Faery Queene, to appoint him some knight, to performe that adventure, which being assigned to Sir Guyon, he presently went forth with that same Palmer: which is the beginning of the second booke and the whole subject thereof.2 The third day there came in, a Groome who complained before the Faery Queene, that a vile Enchaunter called Busirane had in hand a most faire Lady called Amoretta, whom he kept in most grievous torment, because she would not yield him the pleasure of her body.Whereupon Sir Scudamour the lover of that Lady presently tooke on him that adventure. But being unable to performe it by reason of the hard Enchauntments, after long sorrow, in the end met with Britomartis, who succoured him, and reskewed his love. But by occasion hereof, many other adventures are intermedled, but rather as Accidents, then intendments.3 As the love of Britomart, the overthrow of Marinell, the misery of Florimell, the vertuousnes of Belphoebe, the lasciviousnes of Hellenora, and many the like.4 Thus much Sir, I have briefly overronne to direct your understanding to the welhead of the History, that from thence gathering the whole intention of the conceit, ye may as in a handfull gripe al the discourse, which otherwise may happily5 seeme tedious and confused. So humbly craving the continuaunce of your honorable favour towards me, and th’eternall establishment of your happines, I humbly take leave. 23. January. 1589.6 Yours most humbly affectionate. Ed. Spenser.

1

eftesoones: immediately. This description is at variance with the beginning of Book Two at several points— e.g., the Palmer is already with Guyon when they encounter the bloody baby in Canto One. 2

3

intendments: matters of central import. This description seems to make Scudamour the hero, rather than Britomart. 5 happily: by chance. 6 In the new calendar, 1590. 4

THE LIFE OF EDMUND SPENSER Spenser (c. 1552–1599) was from a merchant family, possibly involved in the cloth trade and probably living in London. Although he may have been related to the noble family of Spencers, Spenser was not a gentleman. He was fortunate to attend the Merchant Taylors’ School, an academy founded by the tailors’ guild, and was registered there as a “poor scholar.” The school, however, was excellent; in his eight years there, Spenser received a humanist education that was rich in classical scholarship and languages. In 1569 he entered Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. Again he was a scholarship student, called a sizar, earning room and board by performing servants’ duties. In the same year that he arrived at Cambridge, Spenser was first published: several of his translations from Italian and French appeared in the Protestant miscellany A Theatre for Worldlings. Spenser completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1573, and then, in 1576, a Master of Arts (finishing 66th out of a class of 70). Spenser then began a career as secretary to high-ranking men, a position of some importance involving a broad array of duties that included much traveling and writing. Intermittent records show him serving as an emissary for the earl of Leicester, and in 1578 he was secretary to John Young, Bishop of Rochester. In 1579 he married Maccabaeus Chylde; we know little about the couple’s family life other than the fact that they had two children. In 1580 he was appointed secretary to Lord Grey de Wilton, the new Lord Deputy of Ireland, and traveled there with him. Spenser’s career as a secretary and subsequent work as a civil servant in Ireland no doubt took up much of his time. But he was simultaneously establishing a second career as a poet. Probably while working for Leicester, Spenser met Philip Sidney and entered into his sophisticated literary circle. In 1579 Spenser published The Shepheardes Calender, his innovative and enormously influential collection of pastorals. It revealed Spenser not only as one of England’s most skilled poets, but as a deeply interested and progressive Protestant thinker. He also cultivated his university friendship with the humanist scholar Gabriel Harvey, which in 1580 led to the publication of several of their letters. The Harvey letters mention several lost works, and suggest that by 1580 Spenser had begun working on The Faerie Queene. Meanwhile, in Ireland with Lord Grey, Spenser participated in the complicated and exceedingly violent project of English colonialism. Grey was sent to govern a country that was struggling broadly against English domination, and he adopted a strategy of overwhelming force, including the notorious slaughter of 600 military prisoners at Smerwick, and policies aimed at subduing the population through famine. To what 227

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extent Spenser participated in Grey’s governance, and to what extent he merely accompanied him and performed secretarial duties, is unclear. But it is clear that Spenser profited personally from empire building. Although Grey was recalled to England in 1582, Spenser made Ireland his permanent home, first in the New Abbey estate, and in 1589 in the three thousand acres of the Kilcolman estate. Throughout the 1580s, Spenser received a number of governmental appointments and established himself in Ireland as a well-off planter and gentleman. His complex relationship to Ireland is largely understood through A View of the Present State of Ireland, a prose dialogue that forthrightly defends Grey’s violent tactics and advocates deeply repressive measures against the Irish. It has called forth both defenses of the poet and declarations of his complicity in the outrages of colonialism. The subtleties of A View cast a similarly complicated light on The Faerie Queene, which was written in Ireland, and reflects its beautiful and pitifully war-torn landscape. In Ireland Spenser became friends with the explorer, author, and courtier Sir Walter Raleigh, who in 1589 traveled with him to England. Probably with the sponsorship of Raleigh, Spenser presented the first three books of The Faerie Queene to Elizabeth, who, by Spenser’s report, was well pleased. Spenser secured the printer William Ponsonby in London, and Books One through Three of The Faerie Queene were published in 1590. The poem was a clear effort to win court favor, with a dedication to Elizabeth and as many as seventeen dedicatory sonnets to the major figures in court. As a reward, Spenser was granted a pension of £50 a year for life. Such a position in the patronage system of the day was not unusual, as poetry was commonly used as a means of preferment in court— for noblemen such as Sidney and Raleigh, it was one more personal accomplishment; for those like Spenser who were not noble, it was a way to win social and economic advantages. Spenser, however, maintained skepticism toward court life. In his pastoral “Colin Clouts Come Home Againe,” which tells of his and Raleigh’s journey to court, Colin declares that it is no sort of life, For shepheard fit to lead in that same place, Where each one seeks with malice and with strife, To thrust downe other into foule disgrace, Himselfe to raise. (688–92) Spenser returned to Ireland, where he lived, worked, and wrote throughout the 1590s. He published several important poems under the title of Complaints in 1591. In 1594 he married Elizabeth Boyle, resulting

The Life of Edmund Spenser

229

in at least one child, and in the following year he published Amoretti and Epithalamion, which celebrate their love and marriage. Throughout these years he continued work on The Faerie Queene, and in 1596 published the second edition. This extended the poem to six books; its final form was reached in the posthumous 1609 edition, with the inclusion of the fragment of a seventh book, the Mutabilitie Cantos. In 1596 he also published Fowre Hymnes and Prothalamion. Spenser may have traveled to London to oversee the second printing of The Faerie Queene. If so, he returned to an Ireland wracked by rebellion. In 1598 the Tyrone Rebellion reached Munster, and Spenser and his family fled Kilcolman just before the estate was sacked and burned. Spenser carried letters from the President of Munster to the Privy Council in England, describing the military crisis. On January 13, 1599, while still in England, Spenser died. His life ended under the shadow cast by the destruction of his home and the scattering of his interests in Ireland, which Ben Jonson described, possibly hyperbolically, as dying “for lack of bread.” Spenser’s hearse was reportedly attended by poets, who threw their verses and pens into his tomb as he was buried in Poets’ Corner at Westminster Abbey.

TEXTUAL NOTES Book Six is based upon the 1596 edition of The Faerie Queene, from microfilm of the volume in the Huntington Library (STC 23082). It has been checked against the 1609 edition, from microfilm of the volume in the Harvard University Library (STC 23083). Book Seven is based on the 1609 edition, and has been checked against the 1611 edition, from microfilm of the copy in the Library of Congress (STC 23083.7). In both Book Six and Book Seven, some emendations have been adopted from J. C. Smith’s 1909 edition and the Variorum Edition of 1938. The texts for this volume have been prepared with the assistance of the Renascence Online text of the University of Oregon. Quotation marks have been added; i, j, s, u, and v have been modernized; and abbreviations, ampersands, and diphthongs have been spelled out. Departures from the 1596 edition in Book Six and the 1609 edition in Book Seven have been made with the aim of clarifying the text for modern readers. The table below lists substantive variants. VI.Pr.5.2 that,] 1596; that 1609. VI.i.13.9 pay.] 1609; pay 1596. VI.i.23.6 carcasse] 1609; carkarsse 1596. VI.i.24.4 day,] 1609; day. 1596. VI.i.25.9 requight.] 1609; requight 1596. VI.i.28.6 he] 1609; thou 1596. VI.ii.3.2 act and deed] 1596; deed, and word 1609. VI.ii.6.7 launch] 1596; launce 1609. VI.ii.14.3 Sayd] 1596; Staid 1609. VI.ii.30.6 wrong.] 1609; wrong 1596. VI.ii.39.2 implements] 1596; ornaments 1609. VI.ii.42.9 sight] 1596; sigh’t 1609. VI.iii.3.6 incline,] 1609; incline. 1596. VI.iii.4.8 me,] 1596; me! 1609. VI.iii.10.2 to no] 1596; not to 1609. VI.iii.13.7 rust,] 1609; rust. 1596. VI.iii.42.4 approve] 1609; reprove 1596.

VI.iii.42.7 reprove] 1609; approve 1596. VI.iv.4.7 stroke] 1596; strokes 1609. VI.iv.13.4 perswade] 1596; perswade. 1609. VI.iv.13.8 There] 1596; Where 1609. VI.iv.27.8 lament,] 1596; lament? 1609. VI.iv.28.1 what] 1596; What 1609. VI.iv.30.5 these] 1596; those 1609. VI.iv.30.6 overthrow] 1609; overthow 1596. VI.iv.33.2 sides] 1596; side 1609. VI.iv.34.6 faire] 1596; Faire 1609. VI.iv.35.3 Lo] 1609; Low 1596. VI.v.1.2 be wrapt] 1609; bewrapt 1596. VI.v.11.7 require] 1609; requre 1596. VI.v.13.2 enemies]1596; en’mies 1609. VI.v.24.7 fit] 1596; fit, 1609. VI.v.28.2 live] 1596; lives 1609. VI.v.36.4 off] 1609; of 1596.

230

Textual Notes VI.v.39.3 glee] 1596; gree 1609. VI.v.41.2 their] 1596; there 1609. VI.vi.6.5 faire] 1596; Faire 1609. VI.vi.7.8 restraine] 1609; restaine 1596. VI.vi.16.1 th’other] 1596; the other 1609. VI.vi.17.7 Calepine] 1938; Calidore 1596, 1609. VI.vi.24.9 hight.] 1596; hight; 1609. VI.vi.30.7 ground] 1609; gound 1596. VI.vi.35.6 right] 1596; fight 1609. VI.vi.36.1 thy] 1596; this 1609. VI.vii.1.1 the] 1596; a 1609. VI.vii.13.5 deed.] 1609; deed, 1596. VI.vii.14.6 how] 1596; How 1609. VI.vii.17.6 tracting] 1596; tracking 1609. VI.vii.35.8 there] 1596; their 1609. VI.vii.38.7 Throgh] 1596; Through 1609. VI.viii.11.9 two] 1609; tow 1596. VI.viii.17.6 For] 1596; From 1609. VI.viii.20.7 sight] 1596; sigh’t 1609. VI.viii.22.2 accompt] 1596; account 1609. VI.viii.32.4 nought,] 1609; nought. 1596. VI.viii.45.9 a loud] 1596; aloud 1609. VI.viii.47.3 toyles] 1596; toyle 1609. VI.viii.48.9 launch] 1596; launce 1609. VI.viii.50.4 they] 1596; shee 1609. VI.ix.6.5 God them] 1596; God him 1609. VI.ix.13.9 wild] 1596; will’d 1609. VI.ix.26.1 eare] 1596; care 1609. VI.ix.36.8 Oenone] 1909; Benone 1596, 1609. VI.ix.41.6 clout] 1596; Clout 1609. VI.ix.45.5 breeds] 1609; breeds: 1596. VI.ix.46.5 dwell] 1611; well 1596, 1609.

231

VI.x.2.9 on] 1596; in 1609. VI.x.13.4 fray] 1609; fray. 1596. VI.x.21.4 with in] 1596; within 1609. VI.x.25.8 countrey] 1609; counrtey 1596. VI.x.31.5 Which] 1609; Whch 1596. VI.x.32.6 impure] 1609; impare 1596. VI.x.39.9 flocks] 1596; flocke 1609. VI.x.40.6 sight] 1596; sigh’t 1609. VI.x.44.8 But] 1596; And 1609. VI.xi.9.7 the instant] 1596; th’instant 1609. VI.xi.10.8 be] 1596; he 1609. VI.xi.11.6 that] 1596; the 1609. VI.xi.17.8 heare:] 1609; heare. 1596. VI.xi.19.9 Launcht] 1596; Lanc’t 1609. VI.xi.24.1 reliv’d] 1596; reviv’d 1609. VI.xi.25.7 sight] 1596; sigh’t 1609. VI.xi.32.1 alone?] 1609; alone: 1596. VI.xi.36.5 they] 1596; him 1609. VI.xii.12.8 loos] 1596; praise 1609. VI.xii.13.5 Throughout] 1609; Troughout 1596. VI.xii.19.9 faine?] 1609; faine. 1596. VI.xii.25.4 th’Images] 1596; the Images 1609. VI.xii.35.8 shone:] 1609; shone. 1596. VI.xii.40.7 learned] 1596; gentle 1609. VI.xii.41.2 Hope] 1609; H’ope 1596. VI.xii.41.5 tongues] 1609; tongnes 1596.

232

Textual Notes

VII.vi.7.4 the empire] 1611; th’empire 1609. VII.vi.29.5 Procrustes] 1909; Procustes 1609, 1611. VII.vii.9.1 hard] 1611; heard 1609. VII.vii.12.5 Peleus] 1611; Pelene 1609. VII.vii.15.6 I] 1609; are 1611. VII.vii.15.6 do] 1609; to 1611. VII.vii.16.3 thy] 1609; my 1611.

VII.vii.28.3 did beare] 1609; beare 1611. VII.vii.40.1 full] 1611; full full 1609. VII.vii.41.7 th’Idaean] 1909; th’Iaean 1609, 1611. VII.vii.55.7 saine] 1609; faine 1611. VII.viii.1.7 to] 1609; and 1611. VII.viii.2.9 O!] 1609; O 1611. VII.viii.2.9 grant] 1609; graunt 1611.

GLOSSARY aby: Suffer; pay a penalty; agree.

gentle: Noble; of noble birth.

assay: Try; attack; experience.

heast: Command; vow.

attach: Attack; seize.

hew: Face, appearance, form.

bale: Injury; fate; grief.

hight: Called, named.

bewray: Reveal, betray.

kind, kynd: Nature.

boot: Matter; succeed; profit.

launch: Pierce, lance.

carelesse: Carefree.

lewd: Rude; bad; ignorant.

carl: Churl, villain.

maugre: In spite of.

caytive: Villain; captive, slave.

meed: Reward, bribe.

clowne: Rustic, a simple man.

meete: Proper, suitable.

decay: Death.

mickle: Much; great.

descry: Discover; perceive.

mone: Grief, moan.

despight: Anger; malice; contempt.

paine: Labor; trouble.

dight: V.: prepare; sort out; adj.: placed; worn.

privily: Secretly.

plight: Promise; placed. quell: Kill.

doome: Judgment; fate. dread: Powerful.

read, rad, aread: Judge; declare; tell; understand; interpret; prophesy.

earst, erst: Previously.

recure: Recover; restore.

eftsoones: Immediately; afterwards.

rew: Pity.

eke: Also.

salvage: Savage, wild.

emprize: Undertaking, enterprise.

sew: Pursue.

faine, fayne: Adj.: glad; v.: desire; make; imagine.

slight: Trick, deceit.

doubt: Fear.

ruth: Pity, compassion.

shent: Shamed, reproached.

faytour: Villain.

smart: Pain.

fell: Fierce; cruel.

spright: Spirit, breath.

fere: Partner.

stead: Place.

for thy: Therefore.

stound: Situation; wound, hurt.

233

234

Glossary

stowre: Storm; tumult; blow; combat.

weene: Think; believe.

succour: Help.

wend: Travel.

swaine: Youth; farm laborer.

wexe: Grow, wax.

thewes: Manners; habits; lessons.

whyleare: Earlier; recently.

tho: Then.

wight: Person.

thrall: Slave, servant.

wist: Knew.

trace: V.: travel; dance; n.: path, track.

wonne: V.: dwell; live; n.: home.

travel: Work; journey.

wont: To be accustomed.

weed: Clothing.

wreake: Revenge.

weet: Know; learn.

INDEX OF CHARACTERS References to and appearances of major characters in Book Six and Book Seven (the Mutabilitie Cantos) are listed by book, canto, and stanza. In parentheses are references and appearances in the other books. This index is indebted to Shohachi Fukuda’s “The Characters of The Faerie Queene” in Hamilton’s edition of The Faerie Queene. Aladine, VI.ii.16–20, 40–iii.19 Artegall,VI.i.4–10 (II.ix.6;

Decetto, Defetto, Despetto, VI.v.13–22 Diana, VII.vi.37–55 (I.vii.4–5;

III.ii.Arg., 8–26; iii.24–28, 62; iv.4; IV.iv.39–46; v.8–9, 21; vi.2–46; V passim)

III.vi.16–28; IV.x.30)

Disdain, VI.vii.27, 39–viii.30 Enias, VI.vii.3–25; viii.4–13, 28–30 Faerie Queen (Gloriana), VI.x.1, 4, 28; xii.12 (I.i.13; vii.36, 46–47;

Arthur, VI.v.11–41; vi.17–vii.27; viii.4–30 (I.vii.29–ix.20; II.viii.17–xi.49; III.i.1–18; iv.45–v.12; IV.vii.42–47; viii.18–ix.37; V.viii.4–xi.35)

ix.13–16; x.58–59; xi.7; xii.18, 41; II.i.1, 28; ii.40–43; v.11; viii.43; ix.2–6; x.70–76; III.Pr.5; i.2; ii.3; iv.3, 54; IV.iv.17; V.i.3–4; viii.3; xi.37; xii.3) Graces, VI.x.9–25 (II.viii.6; III.vi.2; IV.v.5)

Bellamoure, VI.xii.3–22 Blandina, VI.iii.30–42; vi.30–37 Blatant Beast, VI.i.7–10; iii.24–26; v.14–17; vi.9–12; ix.2–6; xii.22–41 (V.xii.37–41) Briana, VI.i.13–47 Brigants, VI.x.39–xi.51 Calepine, VI.iii.20–iv.40; viii.46–51 Calidore, VI.i.1–iii.26; ix.1–x.39; xi.24–xii.41 Claribell, VI.xii.3–22 Colin Clout, VI.ix.35, 41; x.10–32; VII.vi.40 Coridon, VI.ix.10, 15, 38–44; x.33–41; xi.18–51 Crudor, VI.i.13–5, 29–47 Cupid, VI.vii.32–37; VII.vii.34

Hermit, VI.v.34–vi.15 Jove, VII.vi.7–35; vii.14–17, 48–59 Lord of Many Ilands, VI.xii.4–10 Maleffort, VI.i.15–23 Matilde, VI.iv.26–39 Meliboe, VI.ix.13–34; x.40–43; xi.18, 31, 51; xii.9 Melissa, VI.xii.14–18 Mercury, VII.vi.14–19 Mirabella, VI.vi.16–17; vii.27–viii.30 Molanna, VII.vi.40–54 Mutabilitie, VII passim Nature, VII.vii.4–13, 56–9; viii.2 Pastorella, VI.ix.7–18, 34–46; x.32–xi.51; xii.3–22

(I.Pr.3; II.viii.6; ix.34; III.i.39; ii.26; iii.1–3; vi.11–26, 49–50; x.5; xi.47–49; xii.22–23; IV.x.42)

Cynthia, VII.vi.8–13; vii.50

235

236

Index of Characters

Priscilla, VI.ii.16–20, 40–iii.19 Salvage Man, VI.iv.2–16; v.1–11, 25–41; vi.22–23, 37–40; vii.23–24; viii.28–29 Salvage Nation, VI.viii.35–49 Scorn, VI.vi.16; vii.27, 39–viii.30 Serena, VI.iii.20–iv.16; v.2–11, 25–vi.16; vii.50; viii.31–51

Timias, VI.v.11–vi.16; vii.39–50; viii.3–5, 27 (I.vii.37; viii.3–29; II.viii.17; ix.11; xi.29–31,48; III.i.18; iv.47; v.12–50; IV.vii.23–viii.18)

Tristram, VI.ii.3–39 Turpine, VI.iii.30–iv.8; v.33–34; vi.17–vii.27

WORKS CITED AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING Alpers, Paul. What Is Pastoral? Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. Berger, Harry, Jr. Revisionary Play: Studies in the Spenserian Dynamics. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988. ———. “The Mutabilitie Cantos: Archaism and Evolution in Retrospect.” In Revisionary Play: Studies in the Spenserian Dynamics. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988, 243–73. Bernard, John D. Ceremonies of Innocence: Pastoralism in the Poetry of Edmund Spenser. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. Burrow, Colin. Epic Romance: Homer to Milton. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993. ———. Edmund Spenser. Plymouth: Northcote House, 1996. Cain, Thomas H. Praise in The Faerie Queene. Lincoln: Nebraska University Press, 1978. Chamberlain, Richard. Pastoral, Politics and the New Aestheticism. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005. Cheney, Donald. Spenser’s Image of Nature:Wild Man and Shepherd in The Faerie Queene. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1966. Coughlan, Patricia. “The Local Context of Mutability’s Plea.” In Irish University Review: Special Issue, Spenser in Ireland, The Faerie Queene, 1596–1996. Edited by Anne Fogarty. 26 (1996): 320–41. Fletcher, Angus. The Prophetic Moment: An Essay on Spenser. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971. Fogarty, Anne. “The Colonization of Language: Narrative Strategies in A View of the Present State of Ireland and The Faerie Queene, Book VI.” In Spenser and Ireland: An Interdisciplinary Perspective. Edited by Patricia Coughlan. Cork: Cork University Press, 1989, 75–108. Fowler, Alastair. Spenser and the Numbers of Time. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1962. Fowler, Elizabeth. “The Failure of Moral Philosophy in the Work of Edmund Spenser.” Representations 51 (1995): 47–76. Frye, Northrop. “The Structure of Imagery in The Faerie Queene.” In Fables of Identity: Studies in Poetic Mythology. New York: Harcourt, 1963, 68–87. Greenlaw, Edwin. Studies in Spenser’s Historical Allegory. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1932. ———, et al., eds. The Works of Edmund Spenser: A Variorum Edition. 11 vols. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1932–1957.

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238

Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

Guy, John, ed. The Reign of Elizabeth I: Court and Culture in the Last Decade. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995. Hadfield, Andrew. Spenser’s Irish Experience:Wilde Fruyt and Salvage Soyl. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997. ———. “Spenser and the Stuart Succession.” Literature and History 13.1 (Spring 2004): 9–24. ———. “Secrets and Lies: The Life of Edmund Spenser.” In Writing Lives in Early Modern England. Edited by Kevin Sharpe and Steven Zwicker. Oxford: Oxford University Press, forthcoming, 2008. ———, ed. Edmund Spenser. Harlow, Essex: Longman (Longman Critical Readers), 1996. Hamilton, A. C., Hiroshi Yamashita, and Toshiyuki Suzuki, eds. The Faerie Queene. Harlow, England: Longman, 2001. Hannay, Margaret P. “‘The Triall of True Curtesie’: Teaching Book 6 as Pastoral Romance.” In Approaches to Teaching Spenser’s Faerie Queene. Edited by David Lee Miller and Alexander Dunlop. New York: Modern Language Association, 1994, 172–80. Hawkins, Sherman. “Mutabilitie and the Cycle of the Months.” In Form and Convention in the Poetry of Edmund Spenser. Edited by William Nelson. New York: Columbia University Press, 1961, 76–102. Holohan, Michael. “Imaque opus exegi: Ovid’s Changes and Spenser’s Brief Epic of Mutabilitie.” English Literary Renaissance 6 (1976): 244–70. Hulme, Peter. Colonial Encounters: Europe and the Native Caribbean, 1492–1797. London: Methuen, 1986. King, Andrew. The Faerie Queene and Middle English Romance:The Matter of Just Memory. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000. Lethbridge, J. B. “Spenser’s Last Days: Ireland, Career, Mutability, Allegory.” In Edmund Spenser: New and Renewed Directions. Edited by J. B. Lethbridge. Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2006, 302–36. Lupton, Julia. “Mapping Mutability: Or, Spenser’s Irish Plot.” In Representing Ireland: Literature and the Origins of Conflict, 1534–1660. Edited by Brendan Bradshaw, Andrew Hadfield, and Willy Maley. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993, 43–59. McCabe, Richard A. “The Masks of Duessa: Spenser, Mary Queen of Scots and James VI.” English Literary Renaissance 17 (1987): 224–42. ———. “Edmund Spenser, Poet of Exile.” Proceedings of the British Academy 80 (1993): 73–103. McNeir, Waldo F. “The Sacrifice of Serena: The Faerie Queene VI viii 31–51.” In Festschrift für Edgar Mertner. Edited by B. Fabian and U. Suerbaum. Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1968, 117–56.

Works Cited and Suggestions for Further Reading

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Montaigne, Michel. The Essayes of Michel Lord of Montaigne. Translated by John Florio. 3 vols. (1603). Reprinted, London: Dent, 1910. Neuse, Richard. “Book VI as Conclusion to The Faerie Queene.” English Literary History 35 (1968): 329–53. Northrop, Douglas. “The Uncertainty of Courtesy in Book VI of The Faerie Queene.” Spenser Studies 14 (2000): 215–32. Pagden, Anthony. The Fall of Natural Man:The American Indian and the Origins of Comparative Ethnology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982. Paglia, Camile. “Sex.” In The Spenser Encyclopaedia. Edited by A. C. Hamilton. London and Toronto: Routledge/Toronto University Press, 1990, 638–41. Peterson, Richard S. “Laurel Crown and Ape’s Tail: New Light on Spenser’s Career from Sir Thomas Tresham.” Spenser Studies 12 (1998): 1–35. Pugh, Syrithie. Spenser and Ovid. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005. Sidney, Sir Philip. An Apology for Poetry or The Defence of Poetry. Edited by Geoffrey Shepherd. Revised and expanded by Robert Maslen. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2002. Smith, J. C., ed. Spenser’s Faerie Queene. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1909. Spenser, Edmund. For editions of the poetical works, see Greenlaw, Hamilton, Smith, and Zitner. ———. A View of the State of Ireland. Edited by Andrew Hadfield and Willy Maley. Oxford: Blackwell, 1997. Stewart, Stanley. “Sir Calidore and ‘Closure.’” Studies in English Literature, 1500–1900 24 (1984): 69–86. Teskey, Gordon. “Mutability, Genealogy and the Authority of Forms.” Representations 41 (1993): 104–22. ———. “‘And therefore as a stranger give it welcome’: Courtesy and Thinking.” Spenser Studies 18 (2003): 343–59. Tonkin, Humphrey. “The Faerie Queene, Book VI.” In The Spenser Encyclopaedia. Edited by A. C. Hamilton. London and Toronto: Routledge/Toronto University Press, 1990, 283–87. Van Es, Bart. A Critical Companion to Spenser Studies. Basingstoke: Palgrave, 2006. Vickers, Brian. English Renaissance Literary Criticism. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1999. Williams, Arnold. Flower on a Lowly Stalk: The Sixth Book of the ‘Faerie Queene’. East Lancing: Michigan State University Press, 1967. Williams, Kathleen. Spenser’s “Faerie Queene”:The World of Glass. London: Routledge, 1966. Wind, Edgar. Pagan Mysteries in the Renaissance. New York: Norton, 1969. Zitner, S. P., ed. Edmund Spenser, The Mutability Cantos. London: Nelson, 1968.

The Faerie Queene from Hackett Publishing Company General Editor, Abraham Stoll

Book One Edited, with Introduction, by Carol V. Kaske, Cornell University Book Two Edited, with Introduction, by Erik Gray, Columbia University

Edmund Spenser

The

Faerie Queene Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos

BOOK SIX

Spenser’s great work in five volumes. Each includes its own Introduction, annotation, notes on the text, bibliography, glossary, and index of characters; Spenser’s “Letter to Raleigh” and a short Life of Edmund Spenser appear in every volume.

The Faerie Queene

Book Six and the incomplete Book Seven of The Faerie Queene are the last sections of the unfinished poem to have been published. They show Spenser inflecting his narrative with an ever more personal note, and becoming an ever more desperate and anxious author, worried that things were falling apart as Queen Elizabeth failed in health and the Irish crisis became ever more terrifying. The moral confusion and uncertainty that Calidore, the Knight of Courtesy, has to confront are symptomatic of the lack of control that Spenser saw everywhere around him. Yet, within such a troubling and disturbing work there are moments of great beauty and harmony, such as the famous dance of the Graces that Colin Clout, the rustic alter ego of the poet himself, conjures up with his pipe. Book Seven, the “Two Cantos of Mutabilitie,” is among the finest of Spenser’s poetic works, in which he explains the mythical origins of his world, as the gods debate on the hill opposite his Irish house. Whether order or chaos triumphs in the end has been the subject of most subsequent critical debate.

SPENSER

The Faerie Queene, Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos

Books Three and Four Edited, with Introduction, by Dorothy Stephens, University of Arkansas Book Five Edited, with Introduction, by Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego

ISBN-13: 978-0-87220-891-9

90000

FnL1 00 0000

9 780872 208919

HACKETT

Book Six and the Mutabilitie Cantos Edited by Andrew Hadfield, University of Sussex, and Abraham Stoll, University of San Diego, with Introduction by Andrew Hadfield

0891

Edited by ADFIELD and

ANDREW H

ABRAHAM STOLL Introduction by ANDREW HADFIELD